Wanderlust
by Nightheart
Summary: Life's a journey, not a destination, or so they say. Sometimes, whether you want it or not, life's an adventure! And so... the Hunt begins.
1. Chapter 1

Yukari looked over at me; we've been best friends since junior high and all through our high school years and I could read her mind without even having to reach out with my powers. Yukari Uchida and I had been the best of friends since our first year of middle school. It was one of those "opposites attract" kind of friendships. Where Yukari was outgoing, flirtatious and extroverted I was shy, self-contained and hesitant. Even thought I was known as "The quiet one" of our set the friendship between us was strong as a balance of opposites. She drew me out of my shell and I gave her the calm steady equilibrium she needed. I often wished I was a little more like her in some ways; she seemed to make friends so easily and guys just seemed to fall all over themselves (before they learned about her steady relationship with Amano) to flirt with her. I, with my shy eyes and quiet strength just seemed to attract the strange ones.

She was troubled about something, she had her Pensive Face on. It's been almost two years since (to the rest of the normal world) I had disappeared for an entire summer under mysterious circumstances. Yukari knew what had happened of course, she had been there when I was sucked up into a beam of shining blue-white light and taken against my will that first time to another world.

I won't go into all the details about what happened to me, many of them are personal anyway, but what's important is that it changed me inside and I'm not just talking about enhancing my weird psychic abilities. The rest of the world just doesn't seem to understand me anymore. I know a lot of the other students whisper about how "strange" I've been since it happened, I know a lot of them think that something so traumatic happened to me that it flipped my flapjack. Well, I'm not crazy, but even I have to admit that I'm pretty different.

Firstly my powers have gotten freakishly accurate (and a real pain in the neck) since I came back. Second, is harder to pin down. The closest I can come to describing it is a sort of annoyed, discomfited feeling about my daily existence on some days. It's like my whole life has become a once-favorite sweater that shrunk in the wash. Most days I'm pretty happy if I ignore the strange things about myself; life's pretty good here aside of one little thing…

Despite every attempt I've made in the past few years since my freaky powers awakened, they won't go away if I simply ignore them (unfortunately). My mother always said that what cannot be cured must be endured. I've been enduring to the best of my ability, I've managed to work a somewhat normal life around my weird powers. It's my caring heart and meddling personality that gets me in the most trouble to be honest. I've been working on it, really I have, but I'm afraid that I'm just the kind of person that can't see something wrong without trying to fix it. My father used to tease me that if I saw a pile of rope tangled up on the floor I'd spend all day untangling it just because it interfered with my sense of what was right in the world. Whehter I liked it or not, I was the kind who butted in with other peoples problems and my powers only excaberated the situation. Fortunately, they also gave me an edge so when I butted in and gave advice it was usualy right on the money. I'd hate to have a reputation for giving bad advice. The Sight let me see things that would help.

Having the Second Sight makes me privy to a great deal of inner secrets, things people probably wouldn't feel comfortable with me knowing about if they knew that I know. I've learned diplomacy and tact because with all of this maturity and insight I've gained comes the inevitable cycle... I'm so good at giving out the perfect advice for any situation that everybody comes to me. It's like I've become some kind of answer-guru! I don't have all of the answers by the way, however, it's just my luck that my advice is almost never wrong. It's that whole Second Sight thing; it gives me an unfair advantage.

Anyway, I could tell without even looking at her that my best friend wanted some of my kind, wise, insightful and almost-never-wrong advice. She wasn't long in letting me know either.

"Hitomi," she said walking alongside me on our way home from the train-station.

"I wanted to ask you if you would do a Tarot reading for me."

"You know I gave that up Yukari", I said. "The future is what you make of it."

"But I don't want to know the future," Yukari replied. She pulled out her very best pleading look, the one that always makes me cave. It doesn't help that I'm a softie.

"Plleeeeeeeease," she begged.

"But I-"

"Pretty, pretty, _pretty_ please," Yukari pressed.

"What is it that you want to know?" I asked, relenting. I'd given up reading the future with Tarot cards... but that didn't mean I'd given them up entirely. It is after all, my favorite hobby. Okay, so I have some pretty bad memories involving them too, but hey, one learns from experience. Tarot is all about journeys anyway, and they didn't necessarily have to be used to predict the future, reading a situation is fine too. That's my loophole and I'm sticking to it!

"I think Amano might have found someone else," Yukari said worriedly.

I couldn't help it, I looked at her like she was crazy. Amano? Find someone else? Ha! There's a laugh, I practically have to bribe him to get any time alone with my best friend. I am so the fifth wheel in their relationship.

"But Yukari, Amano is crazy about you, you know that!" I told her firmly.

"I know, but he's been acting really strangely lately," Yukari said in distress.

"How so?"

"Well, when we went shopping the other day he seemed kind of distracted. He didn't even ask me to go into the lingerie store and try something on! Not once! Usually that's the first thing he asks but he didn't even blink when we passed it!"

Yukari's told me about many a trip to the Victoria's Secret and Fredricks of Hollywood that's ended up with smiles all around. Yeesh! I know more about their love life than I do about my own (not that I have a love life anyway). Man, those two... I gotta say in all honesty, I don't know where they get the energy, if I'd spent a night doing all of the things Yukari tells me about I wouldn't be able to move the next day! Amano just loves to dolly his precious girlfriend up in lace and silk and sexy things, and Yukari (the little kink) loves the kinds of things she knew he'd let her do to him when she wore them. I all honesty I'm not certain whether they're both just healthy teenagers who are open and honest with one another about their sexuality or just plain kinky... the jury is still out to lunch on that one.

"Maybe he's out of money," I suggested, not really buying it. Amano was loaded.

"His dad's the owner of Susu Corporation, the third largest robotics development firm in Japan. Amano always has money," Yukari reminded me.

"Maybe he was just distracted by something else. You know how much pressure he's been under lately," I said. It was true after all; his dad's been pushing him to perfect his English so that he can study abroad and go the Oxford College in England before he comes home to take his position as heir to the company.

"That's true," Yukari said. "But the lingerie thing was just one thing, that's not what really has me so worried."

"What's up?" I asked, now really curious. I knew I was probably later going to wish that she hadn't told me because Yukari never skimps on the details. Thanks to my dear best friend I no longer even needed to read Cosmo for enlightenment, I had my very own personal sex guru.

"Last night when I went to meet him at our usual room in our favorite love hotel he... well, he didn't wanna..."

Okay, I am officially speechless with shock; didn't wanna? I've long since resigned myself to the fact that my best friend is a virtual sex-fiend, and that she's going to share every last detail of her favorite past-time with her very best friend in the whole world. That being me, hearing the concept of abstinence with no reason from either of them was like hearing that the sun was going to start rising in the west tomorrow. Amano is just as bad (if not worse) than Yukari, it's like sex is his life-energy and if he doesn't have regular time with his baby he'll shrivel up and die. There is one small ray of brightness in this otherwise annoying sea of too-much-information... Amano doesn't share the details with me! Yukari however is not so considerate. She brags about his appetite, his endurance, and especially of the way he had of finishing her off, over and over.

"He... he..." Yukari teared-up in dismay. "He wanted to... cuddle."

I was forced to do a double take. Cuddle? The words Yukari, Amano and cuddle did not belong in the same sentence together. Condoms, yes; fuzzy handcuffs maybe... but cuddle? No way. Unless they were talking about afterwards, perhaps.

Amano and Yukari have been going at it like proverbial weasels since he came back from England last year after a year of foreign study abroad. The two of them are possessed of voracious appetites _for each other_. Yukari's mother (single parent) is of a liberal mindset; she just put her daughter on the pill and kept them well supplied with condoms. Amano's father is willing to allow the relationship as long as his son (and future heir to the company) kept up his studies. When Amano's grades start slipping due to too much free time with his honey, Yukari "starves" him until they improve. Having the okay from both sides of the fence gets rid of a lot of time and energy wasted in sneaking around; time and energy that they like to spend... well, you can probably guess.

I sighed, it looked like I was going to have to pull up some wise, meaningful and insightful comment. I'd just start with the obvious.

"Intimacy comes in many forms Yukari," I said. "Maybe Amano is looking for another way of expressing his inner feelings."

"Expression isn't a problem with him," Yukari pointed out. According to Yukari, Amano was a talker... and later, a moaner.

"Besides," she continued. "He likes it when we hit it together. He says that its when he knows we were made for each other."

Again with the information. That's okay, Yukari was Yukari; there's sort of a sweet ingenuousness to her blunt, open, frankness involving her personal life. It looked like I was going to have to go out on a limb here.

"Maybe he's worried that he's taking advantage of you," I said. "He's probably just trying to make certain you get intimacy as well as sex. He probably read somewhere that it will make you happier and show that he cares about you. A lot of books and magazines say so."

"That could be," Yukari said dubiously. She didn't look convinced.

"But Amano's still acting a little oddly. There's something on his mind and he won't tell me what it is. Amano's never hidden anything from me before. He must be tired of me!"

And how was this the obvious conclusion? The only way Amano might be tired was probably that he had finally managed to exhaust himself. Still, it wouldn't be diplomatic to make the joke because my friend is obviously in distress. Soothe worries now, joke later.

Yukari meanwhile is on the verge of tears; I know darned well that Amano hadn't lost interest, in fact, he's probably more interested than he's ever been if my reading of him is accurate (and I have no reason to think that it isn't). So it has to be something else. In order to reassure my very upset friend that whatever was wrong wasn't what Yukari fears it looks like I'm stuck for it. I pulled out my cards.

"Now, this is just going to take a closer look at the past and present," I warned her. I quickly shuffled the deck with the querants question in mind and laid out three cards for a quick read.

"Two of Cups for recent past," I said. "That tracks. It means that there is a healthy harmonious, and mutual relationship involved."

I flipped over the final two cards, studied them for a moment and couldn't keep a small smile from my face. Interesting, but far be it from me to let the cat out of the bag. Instead, I told Yukari

"There's the problem and it's nothing to worry about. He's concerned mainly with a family matter. Ten of birds... family support, financial security, security of the home. Ten of Fish, ah... it's a positive card."

What I so carefully wasn't mentioning was the fact that this reading was hinting very strongly at a possible marriage. I don't want to ruin the surprise for Yukari of course, but I'd have to make certain to visit Amano later and offer my assistance. If I know him he's probably driving himself crazy worrying about getting her the right size ring, asking his father for permission to get engaged so young, and other various minutiae.

"You're sure? There are a lot of fish in the reading, it could be a matter of a change of heart," Yukari pointed out worriedly.

"It's not," I replied filling my voice with utter certainty. Yes Yukari... you will believe me.

"The cards have to do with the heart and the family," I continued. "But all of them are very positive cards; if there were any conflicting emotions, there would have been a sword. None of them were reversed so I thinks it's safe to say that there's nothing wrong. It's a very positive reading. Don't worry Yukari."

I patted her shoulder and Yukari immediately felt better. Of course it could be also the fact that I was using a new aspect of my abilities that I had discovered recently; I could project and aura of calm and relaxation and if I touched someone while I was projecting they'd feel it and start relaxing. My powers had expanded a little as I grew and matured. No more scary visions thank heavens... well, sort of anyway. Sometimes if I accidentally touched someone skin to skin and they were feeling something very strongly I'd get flashes of their. It was a problem because I was the sort that couldn't see a problem without trying to help; perfect strangers did not always like me trying to butt in and try to solve their problems. I learned very quickly that they liked it even less that a stranger was privy to their personal private business. I had even received a threat or two after trying to help someone particularly touchy so for the most part I just tried to keep my powers and thier secrets to myself. My dousing was still the most useful of all of my abilities, but the ability to tell when someone was lying to me (or at least not telling me the whole truth) was very useful as well. At least I'm not getting knocked flat on my ass every other time I turn around with visions of fire and death and destruction.

I don't mean to get off on a rant here... but how the hell am I responsible for pulling bad futures into place! Queen Varie once told me that the world was reacting to the power of my anxious heart and it was my fault that all of these bad things were happening. At first I was shocked, dismayed and traumatized by the realization. But then when i went back and thought about it later... the only realization I made was that the woman had to be full of it. Granted, there is power within a single soul to change the universe, and granted, due to my powers Gaea seems to react a little more emphatically to my wishes that to the average Joe Gaean; but seriously, there's just no way it could have been all my fault.

First off, there was Zaibach who started the whole mess in the first place. They had plans on starting up a war to end all wars way before I ever got kidnapped by yon beam of light. If anything I'd say that thier plans to attack was the cause of me being brought to that world and not the effect... B does not lead to A here people. It doesn't make sense! If my supposed "visions that came from an anxious heart" was really pulling the worst of all possible futures into place then what about all of those visions I got that we managed to prevent from happening? And what about the visions I got that only showed peoples pasts or thier emotions? Those only gave me a deeper look at peoples motives; they didn't actually cause anything. And as for the Visions of fire and death and destruction... well, it was a war. Really, what else was I going to see?

The Visions were more like timely warnings and most of them had to do with things that other people had decided for themselves that I had nothing to do with. It's not like I went up to the doppleganger and said; "hey... you know there's some people in Freid that really need killing; why don't you disguise yourself as their Plaktu and go see if you can't steal their Key?" I know Varie probably had good intentions; but she really did a lot more harm than good when she opened her mouth. Here I am, a fifteen year old girl who'd never before been away from her home or family for even a week at a time suddenly thrust in the middle of a battle zone with a bunch of strangers I barely know getting flattened by freaky-ass visions and I'm supposed to take this well! I'd like to see her try to handle all of that at my age and see how well she fares!

There, I said it. Maybe I'm dwelling on it, but I feel so cleansed!

Well, no rest for the gifted I say. I parted ways with Yukari at the station and made my way over to Amano's house.

Amano answered the door looking frazzled, and on edge. The very instant he laid eyes on me however his face went slack with relief. It was nice to be appreciated.

"Ah, Hitomi, thank god. Just the person I needed to see," he said. "Come in, come in."

I stepped across the portal and into the spacious interior of the Susumu residence. You could tell that Amano's parents were loaded by the sheer size of their residence in the middle of Tokyo. The living room looked like it had been through a small sized typhoon, and Amano himself looked... frazzeled. That didn't happen often, Amano was a lot like Allen from Gaea (and I did not want to speculate about Allen's love life, I got quite enough of and earful about Yukari's and Amano's) he was always smooth-looking. It helped that he came from money, so he was always well dressed, but Amano was also always well-groomed.

"How in the world do you always seem to just "know"?" He asked amazement as he led me over to the living room and sat her down. What can I say? It's a gift. In answer, I just smiled a mysterious, knowing smile and waited for him to say what it was that had him in a tizzy.

"You wouldn't happen to know Yukari's ring size would you?" he asked agitatedly. He was pacing the room like he couldn't sit still, running his hands through his hair and looking agonized. "Does she like diamonds? Which of these do you think is better?"

The poor guy babbled in an endless ramble as he shoved about four different jewelry catalogues from expensive jewelers at me.

"Or do you think she'd preffer a hand crafted ring?"

"Amano, slow down, I can barely keep up with you," I said. I projected a feeling of calm at him but in his present state it slid off him like rainwater.

"I wanna marry her Hitomi," he stated bluntly.

"I suspected as much," I replied calmly, as I picked up the various catalogues from around the room and arrayed them neatly in front of me.

"Don't you think you're a little young?" I couldn't help asking. "Most people wait until after college; you are still going to college aren't you?"

"Yes, that's part of the reason," he said, inchoately. "I want to marry her before I go. If she's my wife I could get a special visa for her and we'd be together in England. I can't stand the thought of being separated from her for a month let alone entire years at a time."

Oh, thanks, way to bring that up buddy, I thought as I repressed the sudden pang of sadness I felt at the reminder of being separated from someone I love.

We could still feel each other. It was like there was an invisible string that connected our hearts. Sometimes in my sleep, when I dreamed, I could feel him there reaching out across the distance to me. There were times even when I was wide awake when I could feel him there, quiet and steady. There were times when I could feel that he needed me, needed my assurances, needed the strength of my belief. And I could reach him, feel him, send him my thoughts and my beliefs. It made it difficult to move on but I couldn't let go of it either. I couldn't turn my back on someone who knew my soul as I knew his. There would be times, I knew, when for no reason at all we would need each other; we would need the comfort of someone who would understand the other from the inside out.

Oh don't get me wrong, I'm not pining or anything. I like my life! It's quiet, its safe (if a little predictable) and best of all, there's no danger, no life-threatening adventures, and (mostly) no freaky powers. I'm just a normal girl. I like being a normal girl.

I forced my attention back to the matter at hand.

Amano could be impetuous and stubborn, he wouldn't listen to his father if his old man tried to caution him about moving too quickly so naturally I felt the need to be the voice of reason in this. I know they love each other; fiercely and passionately... but I wondered a little if it had staying power to last or would it burn itself out?

They started out as friends and then grew into deeper feelings for one another. Even after their relationship was announced they went through an entire years worth of separation without straying; there have been many relationships that have fallen apart from less. Still... they're both so young. 

"Amano, you know I love you and Yukari both very much, and you know I want the best for you both. Despite the fact that I want you two to share every happiness together I feel I must counsel caution in this case. You've spent a lot of time together it's true but intermittent time is different from living together day in and day out. If you have to live together you may find out that there are things about each other that you just can't stand."

"Are you kidding? Waking up to her beautiful face every morning? Tying my tie before I go to work, quiet evenings at home just her and me, breakfast in bed..."

Amano had that distant dreamy look in his eyes. He was seeing his rosy future. Crazy sex addiction aside, Amano is a romantic at heart; a real sensitive guy.

"Finding her stockings hanging in your shower stall, running out of shaving cream because she's used it all on her legs, getting your clothes mixed together, arguing about finances because she thinks budget wisely means buy that new dress when it's on sale," I couldn't help pointing out. Hey, there was a lot more to that living together idea than the rosy parts... it had it's share of thorns too.

"You yourself told me that every couple has to do some adjusting to the habits of the other, and the occasional argument was to be expected. I'm sure we'll do our adjusting and have our squabbles like anyone else. Hitomi, I know you're worried about it, but I have faith."

Well... shut my mouth. Casual, careless, slacker-Amano actually made a mature and responsible statement! Oh, don't get me wrong I like the guy and he's my best friend's other best friend but he had a tendency to put the cart before the horse from time to time. His upbringing with his nice house and rich family had given the guy a tendency to overlook the obvious concerns because they'd always been already taken care of or easily managed with the application of the right amount of money. Getting into a relationship in which he would have to mature and grow could only be good for him.

"Then I give you my blessing. Not that you need it really, but it'll go a lot easier with me helping."

"Thanks Hitomi, that means a lot to me," Amano said sincerely. "If you were a boy, I'd ask you to be the best man but since youre not..."

"I'll still feel honored," I said, smiling crookedly at him.

We spent the next hour debating over ring choices; Amano seemed to favor the idea of buying her the Rock of Gibraltar, and while money wasn't a concern to him, neither was taste!

"Amano," I said after he showed me another particularly enormous square ring he'd run across. "I can understand that you want Yukari to see how much you love her, but really hun, you could buy a small country with that thing."

"Look how sparkly it is," he pointed out. "Yukari loves sparkly... all girls love sparkly when it comes to engagement rings."

"If nothing else she could use it as a signal flare," I joked. "They could see the light coming off from that thing in outer space!"

"You think it's too much?"

"Ye-ah," I said. I picked out a pretty ring with a cluster of diamonds around a central diamond with the metal gold of the ring in an elegant wave pattern.

"How about this one?" I said pointing. "It's sparkly, its got plenty of diamonds, and its not so... heavy."

"Hmmm," he said consideringly. "How about this one?"

Oh boy, he'd picked out another mountain. Time to compromise here buddy.

"No. But this one is nice," I said, showing him a picture of one that seemed to be a good match for Yukari. It had a nice fat maquis cut diamond in the center with delicate scrollwork surrounding it that had delicate sparkling seed-sized diamonds worked into the pattern.

"It looks nice," he said a little reluctantly. Geeze, he begs me to help him and then doesn't want to take my advice... men!

"It's perfect for her," I said firmly. "Yukari used to have a cheap silver one that looked a little like it that she absolutely loved, only it had a blue glass aquamarine in the center... but she lost it somewhere. She used to wear it all the time though."

"So you think this is the one for her?" Amano said.

"Yes, she'll like it," I replied with certainty.

I was surprised when my cell phone chose that exact moment to ring; it was Yukari. Amano slapped his forehead and mouthed that he'd forgotten that he'd invited her over to dinner. I helped him as he frantically stashed the ring catalogues. I had to think quickly to explain how it was that I was already over at Amano's house without her. I told her i'd stopped by quickly on my way home from school for quick help on y math work; Amano was really good at math and the three of us were study buddies... well actually it usually turned out that I studied while the two of them made out on the floor of his room. Or, if they actually did make it to the table and cracked a book, they ended up turning the study session into a massive game of footsie under the table.

Now that the choosing of the ring was out of the way Amano wanted to perfect place to propose to his darling. I sighed... why me? I told him to take her on a nice romantic get away and propose there whenever the moment felt right.

I could see that he was getting that Big Plan look in his eyes. Yes, I know that at our age, doing the whole big proposal thing was considered cool; I knew a guy that had taken his intended on a sky-diving trip and had some farmer plow out crop-circles in his feild asking her to marry him. That was pretty big. Amano had the funds to pull off something like that, hell if he wanted to he could have it posted on that big screen in the middle of Tokyo but my poor friend would probably die on the spot. Yukari actually wasn't the type for that though... I knew my friend the best out of just about anyone and I was pretty sure that she'd probably like the proposal small and quiet and the wedding big and loud.

"Look," I said. "Just an intimate, heartfelt moment is the memory she'll sigh over for the rest of her life... oh, and as a tip, make sure there's no sex involved if you want her to be able to tell your grandkids about it."

"Small and intimate? But dinner is so overdone," he said.

"So take her out for a hike just the two of you, set up a picnic, and pop the ring out over dessert," I replied. "You could find a nice romantic spot by a lake or with a mountain in the distance... or, well, something like that."

The conversation about the proposal was cut short by the ringing of the doorbell. Yukari was there sporting this cute outfit I'd helped her pick out the last time the two of us went on a clothing spree. We were both kind of obsessed with fashion, she's probably worse than me though, I'm more into the comfortable athletic-wear fashions and she's just a complete fashionista; she wears them all!

I was just about to make my escape, I mean take my leave when Yukari insisted that I stay for dinner. Amano joined in. Damn, they were both doing that puppy-face thing.

"You two don't want to eat alone?" I asked, a little dubiously. I wasn't in to watching her feed Amano while making cooing noises, lord knew I got enough of that over lunch!

"We never spen enough time with all three of us, it's either Yukari and you or Yukari and me... we're all friends. We should hang out and part together," Amano said.

"Hey!" Yukari said brightly. "I just got the best idea! We should have a vacation, just the three of us, to commemorate this time in our lives."

"Sounds like a good idea," Amano said enthusiastically. Oh, yeah, there;s an Idea there was just one problem with that... remember how I mentioned that having been rich for all of his life he doesn't always take into account the obvious things?

"Unfortunately," I pointed out. "I have limited funds. You know how much food and lodging at even a small bed-and-breakfast resort costs? Then there's the expenses for the trip."

"I could cover the costs," Amano said dismissively.

"..."

I admit, I'm not sure if I can stomach the thought of hanging around those two when they're in full lovey-dovey mode for more than a few days without going crazy. I mean, really, I feel odd enough about knowing the details of their sex life without having to be in close proximity to it.

"Aw c'mon Hitomi," Yukari pleaded. "A vacation with just Amano and me is fun but we did one together in the spring. You have to come!"

"I'm sure the two of you will have a lot more... "fun" just the two of you," I protested. "Besides, which one would we chose, trip to the ocean or trip to the mountains?"

I mean that is a pretty big consideration after all; really the beach is the done thing in the summer but the price for those beach houses were outrageous! Besides, I was partial to a something a little more quiet and secluded than a crowded public beach; I knew darned well that if I went to the beach again this year I'd only end up having to politely pretend to be interested in some loser's life story while secretly longing to return to the game of water volleyball. Really, why did those weirdos always seem to come up and talk to me! I mean, it's like they think I'm _one_ of them or something! Last year, I sit down on my blanket in the shade to enjoy a nice cold soda from the cooler and this perfect stranger guy **and his friend** just walk up and sit down like they own the place and start talking to me. I wasn't interested in their club activities, no I didn't want to know their sign, I didn't like giving out my cell number and I didn't want to go somewhere for drinks!

Or if it's not nice weirdos wanting to talk, its _skeevey_ weirdos wanting to do more than talk. At least those ones I know how to handle... if they lay a finger on me my father was a blackbelt and he'd forced me to attend lessons after I returned from disappearing to Gaea. Okay, I admit, at first I wasn't happy about having to attend the completely unfeminine martial arts lessons but what can I say... I'm an athletic person and they kinda grew on me. Nobody ever suspects me because I'm so quiet and polite but I go to the gym three times a week for kickboxing (hey, it's good exercise).

So, in my book the beach was out. Not that I didn't like all the fun activities but really, I could have just as much fun at a hot springs or something. Hey, wait a minute...

"How about a visit to a hot springs resort in the mountains," I said suddenly. I had some connections that could get us rooms for cheap. I still had some money squirreled away from the spring break job I'd had as a conveinience store slave (although to be honest I had been intending to go on a massive shopping spree in china town) but it was a worth it so I guess it was a small sacrifice.

"That way we get to do a little of both," I continued. "My grandmother's best friend runs an outdoor resort. We're still on good terms so I'm sure she'll at least give us a discount. It has lots of fun activities too, mountain biking, camping, hiking all that good stuff. Plus, there's a tour bus that'll run us to the next town over which has a miniature china town in it for shopping."

"Sounds like fun!" Yukari said enthusiastically.

"We'll have to bring our own supplies though," I cautioned. "If we went to buy them there they'd be three times as expensive."

On my way home, when it was quiet and the day was just fading to sunset, I could feel the little twinges on that ephemeral cord of red moon-mist that still connected my heart to Van's heart. He was upset about something, frustrated and upset. He'd been like that all week. I didn't know what the problem was so all I could do was send him my feelings; my faith in him, my pure simple knowing that if anyone could do it, he could. Sometimes that's all it takes, the knowledge that someone out there loves you deeply and unconditionally, to make everything okay for a little while. So that's what I gave him, my deep feelings for him. The knowledge that I was here, quiet and steady inside his heart, and always would be.

"Hey, slow down there Initial D," Yukari said from the passengers seat at the countryside whizzed by outside her window. "The hot springs aren't going anywhere you know."

"Hey babe, you wanna drive... then don't complain," he grinned. "I wish we could go muddin' with this thing."

"Ohhhh no," Yuari said. "No way. You remember what happened the last time you wanted to play in the mud? You nearly got your license revoked by that anal cop."

"I sure wish we could take this baby to a place with no anal retentive traffic cops then," he said wistfully.

I started in surprise, making wishes like that was dangerous! I mean, I know from personal experience that the old saying "be careful what you wish for, you might get it" was not without truth. The universe could be listening.

I got that weird all-over pin-tingly, hot-cold feeling that usually preceded a vision of enormous clarity and I squinched my eyes shut tightly against it. Whatever it was, chances were that I wasn't going to like it. I flashed to a scene somewhere in a forest with a host of cat-people and dog-people (thereby proving that what I was seeing definitely wasn't happening on Earth) circling around some kind of weird looking creature with long spears, jabbing at it. The thing they were harrying looked very strange in my Sight; I couldn't make out what it was, but there was something about it that didn't belong. It felt warped somehow; twisted. Another flash happened and suddenly I was standing out in the clear blue sky, a song came to my ears from out of no-where and everywhere at once. I looked over and saw a woman I didn't immediately recognize looking over at me with a troubled look on her face. Then suddenly I was back in the car, staring out at the scenery speeding by me, like nothing had happened.

What was that? I wondered. Something was going to happen and soon. I tried to push away the feeling of unease growing within me as if by ignoring it I could will it away. The harder I tried to ignore the feeling of prescience the worse it grew. I should have known better than to try to deny my powers their way, I had learned on Gaea that I ignored my instincts to my cost.

I saw a flash of pink with my sixth sense and then everything when blue as we were beamed up by the mother ship.

"Damn," I couldn't help muttering in resignation as our vacation-mobile gently touched down in the middle of nowhere. "Great; here we go again."

Hello and welcome to the first chapter, reviews and comments are appreciated by the way so if you could just click on the little box below… I digress. There's _plenty_ more to come. I'd like to start things out by saying that I love the series and even though I'm writing a continuation fic, I loved the ending to it too (very Anna and the King). I tried to write this fic in sort of the same spirit as the show (aficionados will note that in the series, they didn't actually go to Gaea until nearly the second episode), really anything can happen. I thought writing it in first person might be appropriate since we see the series mostly through the eyes of Hitomi, I tried to keep it as in character as I could based on how I perceived her character and yet allow for a few years growth and maturation. (and if I forget to post the next chapter after a week, you guys might want to remind me).

So anyway, I hope you enjoy.


	2. Chapter 2

Aleisha Kirby Normal Aleisha Kirby 5 56 2005-10-03T22:01:00Z 2005-12-02T04:12:00Z 1 7397 42166 personal 351 98 49465 10.2625 BestFit Clean Clean MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 A

mano stopped the SUV and pulled over to the side of the unpaved dirt path that was all Gaea had for "roads" at this point in history. Urhg... swampland.

"Shit!" Amano swore. "What the hell was that?"

I looked over at him; um, hello… he was there the last time I got kidnapped by that damned beam of light!

"I don't know what it's called," I said. "But have you ever seen those science fiction shows where people get moved around by lasers and stuff? It works something like that."

Yeah, this beam of light just goes around randomly kidnapping my ass every so often... me and my whole family. I had to make a joke out of it, because if I didn't laugh I was going to cry. There was some tiny chibified version of me in the back of my mind kicking and screaming 'I don't wanna be in a war!'

"That's really..." Yukari trailed off. "Ummmm guys...?"

"What babe?" Amano asked, tossing the now-useless map of the place we were going over his shoulder. I'll bet he was wondering what the hell he was supposed to do now. What was it with men and maps? Personally I was praying that I wouldn't get bowled over by some freaky-ass vision... I hate those things and they always seem to get stronger and freakier here on Gaea.

"Don't look now, but..."

You know when they say 'don't look now' and it means that you should always do the opposite? I looked.

"Oh bugger," I muttered.

I had spent some time on Gaea, more than anyone else I knew of had, and in that time I'd seen a lot of things that were very, very weird; this thing topped them all. I wasn't even certain where to begin describing it. In the dim light that managed to filter through the dense forestry and dank, humid air of the swamp it glistened black, furthermore it was shiny as though it was wet somehow. The thing had no discernable gender or even a real shape as it rose from the water with a wet, sucking 'shlep' sound and towered before us in a hulk of mud and swamp weeds.

That's odd, I thought as my second Sight kicked in of its own accord (it did that more often than I was really comfortable with). The thing didn't have even the faintest of auras like any living being exuded, the entirety of its body glowed a malevolent red. It was alive somehow, but this creature was not a normal living being. At least that was what my intuition told me, and I had the sinking feeling in my gut that I was going to know more about it than I wanted to in the fullness of time.

"Now might be a good time to use those powers of yours to figure a way out of this," Yukari said urgently.

"Relax babe," Amano said, slamming the joy-stick out of neutral and pressing petal to metal. "Swamp-thing over there can possibly keep up with this baby on full burn. Hitomi, you just provide us with directions."

I closed my eyes and centered my vision on the pendant in my mind. It bonged softly to the left.

"Turn left now!" I called.

"But there's no-"

"Now!" I insisted. There was a road there, I could see it. Amano obeyed, letting out a whoop as his baby hit the mud and stagnant water with a brown splash that went up all around us. A t least one of us was having fun; as for me I had that fear-for-my-life thing going on.

"Alright!" he cried. "This is more like it!"

He switched out the CD in his player and then started turning some three-sixties, doughnuts and fishtales as the mud gave way before us. Yukari was laughing wildly as we were nearly tossed out of our seats by the bumps and holes he took going well over the speed limit in any land except the autobahn; and they were just having a grand old time.

What the hell? We're being chased by a nine-hundred pound swamp-beast like out of some sixties B-movie and he's playing "Cotton Eyed Joe" on his stereo and acting like were out to go muddin'.

Well... it was pretty fun. I searched around with my senses and couldn't feel the thing anywhere. It must have left to find slower, easier prey. I breathed a sigh of relief and joined in on the good times my friends were having. We were bound to get somewhere eventually...

I will not worry, I will not worry, I will not worry, I chanted mantra-like, under my breath. Bad things happened when I worried so the key was to just take it slow, just relax and concentrate on the little things. Mudding was lots of fun; laugh, be crazy, enjoy myself. Don't think about how I've been kidnapped from my happy safe little life by powers beyond my control that likely wanted me for a purpose I probably wasn't going to like at all. Don't think, just _be_.

Amano was going ninety through the mud when we found the road I'd foreseen. Suddenly I got another flash of vision, we were going to come across someone soon... someone I knew in fact. How convenient.

And so, it begins, I thought dourly.

"Hey!" I called. "Slow down Amano, there's someone up there!"

"I don't see any-" he turned around the bend in the road and abruptly hit the breaks.

"Told you," I said.

Swampy had apparently accumulated more friends from somewhere for there was an entire hunting party slogging around in the swamps looking for it. It popped up in front of us, lucky, lucky us. Someone armed with a spear shouted

"There sir! There it is!" Amano swerved out of the way of a pack of charging humans, armed with spears and nets and swords. I didn't know how I knew, but I could just tell that somehow, those weren't going to help.

"Be careful Allen!" a voice cried from somewhere out among the trees. Its worried, yet cultured tones sounded unmistakably like Millerna. It figured that if there was trouble to be had in the swamps, that Allen was somewhere nearby, and where Allen went, so too went Millerna.

"Princess Millerna! I thought I told you to stay back at the fort!" Allen called back over his shoulder while he went charging in there.

Oh yeah right, like that's going to stop her! I thought wryly.

There was the sound of men screaming a charge to battle somewhere in the woods nearby followed by an inhuman roaring, baying sound; like a cross between a cat-scream and the sound of wolves calling over the mountains. The swamp creature was shlep-shlepping through the swamps, right toward our vehicle with us inside of it. The men who were likely being led by Allen in a hunt to bring it down were being carried on its enormous back and shoulders like so much insignificant baggage. They were giving their all, stabbing at it with knives, swords and spears from all sides but it ignored them, apparently unfazed by the attacks.

"We can't even slow it down boss!" I heard Gaddes yell from somewhere up ahead. He was obviously talking to Allen.

"Amano," I said. "I'm getting out, stay here until I get back."

"But you can't-" he started. I had already opened the door. Bracing myself to ruin my new travel-flip-flops by immersing them in the muck I could only hope that there were no poisonous snakes or something else nasty and dangerous in the water. I jumped in and ran out towards the sound of the rampaging swamp monster.

And why am I running into danger? I wondered at myself. Given my distaste for having to risk life and limb I should be running the other way. But as ever, if I did other people would be hurt and my first instinct was to answer the higher calling. Maybe I should stop listening to that particular instinct, it always seemed to land me in trouble.

The swamp-beastie was huge, bigger than when I had seen it from a distance; easily three or four times the height of a man and several times that in bulk it was shaped like a big black blob of stagnant water hulking about on two tree-trunk-like legs. In the center of what I might have called its forehead if it had anything resembling a real head and not just a lump in the center of two weedy upper appendages there was a strange highly concentrated red light. It swatted at the men attacking it like I might swat away a fly or at least a very large flying pony. All around it brave warriors were taking short flights through the air to land in the stinking water of the swamp.

It looked straight at me, glowing a strange red in my Sight. I didn't know what it was or where it had come from but my instincts were telling me that I was here to do something about it. The only problem was... I didn't know what.

What is that thing? I wondered. Where did it come from? 

I don't know how I knew, but I was utterly certain that this creature was not natural in this strange world. Was it some kind of construct like I had read in my fantasy novels, some kind of creature created to do the bidding of an evil mage? (Did Gaea even have magic or mages?) If so, what was it's purpose?

Speculate later Hitomi, I ordered myself. I wasn't certain why it had been so desperate to pursue me Amano and Yukari so suddenly; but I had a feeling that it had somehow been drawn to us. I didn't know why, but there was something I needed to test.

"Hey!" I cried over at it. "Hey! Hey hey!" I waved my arms above my head, trying to distract it. It perked and twisted its weedy bulk to peer over at me. I wasn't even sure it had eyes, but it seemed to be looking at me. I ran off to the side and it swatted the rest of the men away, ignored the SUV with Yukari and Amano in it, and started pursuing me.

Just as I suspected, I thought. It's me that it wants. But why? 

If it ate humans there were plenty of hunters nearby for it to consume. Why was it interested in me in particular? i hoped I hadn't been brought back to Gaea on the wish of some swamp-monster to become its next meal.

There was a particular spot in my Sight, a place where the red glow concentrated. I kept running but slogging through knee-deep muck was slowing me down and that creature was in its own element as it pursued me. I was a fast runner but swamp-thing was gaining on me quickly.

In a panic, because i didn't know what else to do when I saw it move under my feet and rear up directly in front of me, I froze solid where I stood, threw my hands up and screamed. Something inside of me, something I hadn't even known was there until that moment, welled up from inside my chest. There was a strange feeling all around me, like the hot air was crackling with static and tense with building pressure like just before a storm. Without knowing how I did it, I pushed it at the swamp-creature. The thing let out a low bass howl of anger and perhaps pain that thrummed through my chest and seemed to make the water around me shiver.

Then all was still. The swamp thing sank back into the water without even a ripple, like it had suddenly become one with the water, and the swamp was returned to silence. I looked around me in bewilderment.

Did that just happen? I wondered. I looked down at myself; I was still in one piece. I could hear, distantly, the groans and moans of pain of the hunting party. I slogged back toward the sound of people, perhaps we could get direction to the nearest town from Allen. I climbed back into the safety of the SUV with Yukari and Amano and told them to go forward slowly, we'd be encountering the rest of the group on the road ahead.

Sure enough after not too many moments we came upon the straggling remains of the hunting party, plus a few extra's.

At the side of the road was a small caravan consisting of a rat man, a tall guy wearing a robe and sunglasses with a pony-tail, a pretty blonde wearing pink frills, another pretty blonde with short pale hair and a dazed look about her wearing more pink frills, and yet another tall blonde (but this one was a man) wearing poofy sleeves and a long great-coat. They were all staring at the vehicle with various expressions on their faces; Allen looked wary, Millerna looked amazed and intrigued and Dryden looked... avaricious and intrigued. Well, I couldn't blame them, they were all being pulled along by horse drawn carriages still. Hey, wait a minute... shouldn't they be riding in one of Drydens massive floating barges or at the very least the Crusade that belonged to Allen?

Uhg! Man this swamp reeked! I had swamp-juice all over me. I was smelly now and sticky from the humid, damp, fetid air that seemed to close around me like a hot sweaty glove. Well, you know what they say; it's not the heat, it's the humidity. I felt like I'd just walked into a turkish sauna.

"Hitomi?" Millerna spoke first, breaking the shocked silence.

"In the flesh, unfortunately," I grumbled. Stupid pillar! If I ever found the jack-ass responsible for the invention of the damned thing I was going to rip him a new one! I plucked a little at my halter-top, if the heat could get any worse I didn't want to know.

Think about small things. Worry about the larger problems when you actually have something to worry about, I counseled myself.

"How did you...?" Allen started. "And where did it...?"

"I'm not sure myself," I replied to both of his questions. "I take it that you and your soldiers were out here hunting that thing?"

"Yes," Allen said. "We've been trying to find it for days. This is our fifth skirmish with that thing and we haven't come anywhere close to beating it. What did you do to it?"

"I don't know," I said. "What was that thing?"

"We don't know," Allen said. "We've gotten reports from outlying villages, isolated cot-holds and farms all across Asturia of strange monsters for the past few months or so. This one attacked Castello Fortress a month ago. No-one knows anything about them except that they aren't natural beasts of the wild."

"Great, just great," I muttered. It looked like I had arrived just in time for yet another fun traipse across the map. I felt like cursing and kicking at things, instead I sighed heavily. I looked over at Dryden.

"And what are you doing here?" I asked him. "I thought you were going to become a merchant."

"I heard the rumors about the strange creatures that no-one else could explain so naturally I came to verify it for myself and observe them for study."

"You know for a smart guy, that's not very bright," Allen said to him. Dryden shrugged.

"Hey, when it's in the pursuit of new knowledge I can be as tenacious as the next idiot," here he looked pointedly at Allen. "At least I didn't have the brilliant idea about attacking it."

"Would you prefer that I left it loose to terrorize Asturian citizens?" Allen gritted in reply.

"No, but I would have advised against charging in there without studying it first," Dryden riposted. I exchanged a speaking glance with Millerna, we'd better bust this up before they started to fight. I think Dryden just got a kick out of pushing all of Allen's buttons. Of course... Allen did kinda have a lot of buttons, and not just on his coat.

"Gentlemen," Millerna said, using her best princess-diplomat voice. "I'm sure you both make very valid arguments, but they are both, for the moment, moot ones. That swamp creature won't be seen by any of us for the rest of the day. We should each be getting back to our tasks."

"My apologies princess," Allen said stiffly, bowing to her.

"You guys need a ride?" I asked. "We can squeeze you in there, this thing's official capacity is seven and there's only three of us now."

"What are you-" Allen started, then he shook his head. "Never mind. Yes, your assistance is appreciated."

"Just let me pop up the seat... actually we have the back packed up now that I think about it, just a minute."

I popped back inside to talk with my friends about rearranging some things for company. They were naturally curious about what had happened and who my new friends were.

"Hitomi? What was all of that?" Yukari asked. "Do you know these people? And what was with that B-movie swamp thing?"

"I'm not sure about that thing, but these guys here are my friends from before. Would you mind if we gave them a lift?"

"Sure okay," Amano said. "But the blonde guy stays."

"Allen?" I said in confusion. "Why does everyone always pick on him?"

"He looks like he likes to stay at the YMCA if you _know_ what I mean," Amano said. "And what's with that hair?"

"Amano, I hate to be the one to point this out to you," I said dryly. "But he looks exactly like you."

"No way babe," he said, running a finger though his darker locks. "I'm way better looking. Mister poofy-sleeves over there looks like the fifth village person."

"You guys be nice!" I exclaimed. "These are my friends."

"Okay, okay," Amano relented. "The babe-alicious blonde girl and the pale girl can stay." Yukari promptly leaned over and bit his ear.

"Ow!" Amano yelped, rubbing his injured lobe. "Babe!"

"That's right, I'm your only babe and don't you forget it!" Yukari said fiercely. I left them to their make-out fight and started arranging things for extra passengers.

Amano got out with me followed by Yukari and we popped the back open to remove the bags, hauled up the back-most seat, repacked the bags in the depression that had been occupied by the seat (and just about anywhere else we could fit stuff). Man this air smelled rank! And it was soo incredibly hot! I couldn't wait to get back into the air-conditioning!

Okay," I said after about ten minutes of rearranging in which we argued about the placement of necessities like the cooler of drinks and the box of munchies.

"Pile in gang, dibs on the window!" Amano climbed back up in the drivers seat, Yukari in the shotgun beside him, I grabbed the spot second row closest to the window, Millerna pulled in beside me the other girl (I didn't know her name yet) in beside her. Dryden and Allen got the back row squeezed next to where we'd stuffed the sleeping bags. I sighed in relief as the air conditioning slowly started to kick in and the air freshener clipped to it slowly got rid of that swamp-reek. Ah! Much better!

It had better not have been one of them that had wished me here just to give them a ride back to town... hey, where the hell was town anyway?

"So where are we going?" I asked as Amano started the engine up. Millerna winced at the music and covered her ears.

"Oh, sorry," I said. "Hey Yukari, change the CD!" My friend promptly popped out the muddin' track and popped in some vocal by Ayumi Hamasaki. By the look on Millerna's face it wasn't vast improvement.

"Freid," Millerna said in answer to my previous question. "Prince Chid is having a birthday celebration so I'm going to represent Asturia on my sister's request. Allen here agreed to accompany me and my Lady-in-Waiting Celena on the part of our journey that led through the dangerous swamps."

"Hey uh, I don't mean to be rude here," said Amano. "But could one of you just gimme directions so I can get going?"

"Oh, right," I said sheepishly. I closed my eyes and the pendant bonged straight ahead.

"Just keep going this way," I said. We all reached for something to hold onto as Amano took off. Celena stated out the window in rapt facination and remarked that this thing went fast. I was beginning to wonder if maybe the girl wasn't rowing with both oars in the water, still out of politeness I didn't say anything. Allen was the sensitive type.

"So you were traveling to Freid," I said. "And then what?"

"And then our party got attacked by that swamp monster. Then you showed up," Millerna said.

"What about you Dryden?" I asked. "How'd you wind up as part of our merry band of adventurers?"

"I was on my way back to Asturia from my recent travels in Egzardia with a few presents for Millerna... I don't have them now unfortunately for I'd love to be able to shower you with gifts, pearl of my heart."

This he said to Millerna of course. Her expression was priceless; torn between dismay and amusement.

"Nice," said Yukari. She nudged Amano; "How come you don't call me that?" I guffawed, I couldn't help it. Amano, calling Yukari by annoying long-winded nicknames was just too funny. He was more of a "babe" kind of guy. He was also quick-witted and swift to cover however.

"because if I had a pearl for every time my heart thought of you, thier value on the world market would be drastically under cut," he said. "A gem is most valuable in its scarcity."

"Economically speaking he's quite right," Dryden agreed. "But I have it on good authority that, in the principles of supply and demand, a lady's demand for compliments will always outweigh the readiness of the supply. Thus it is not scarcity that is a factor but the quality of the product and the readiness of delivery."

"Very sage," Amano called back. "But my daddy always told me that where there is a surplus of goods, demand for that good is less; therefore taking that principle into consideration, if an overstock of compliments is delivered then their value decreases."

"Oh good," Millerna muttered. "He's found a soulmate."

"Yukari and I had just finished hitting this out of the way Chinatown," I said. And then I was distracted by the femal need to share in our exploits about our favorite past-time.

"Ooh! We found some of the absolute cutest clothes, let me tell you girl. I found this china dress in my size in the most gorgeous pattern, and then I just had to get the purse to match it-"

"Well naturally," Yukari chimed in. "That dress was cute on you, but I like the red one with the gold lions on it."

"Not with my complexion honey, it looks way better on you," I said.

"You're right," Millerna added in. "You do look better in cooler colors... and... did you lighten your hair?"

"Oh yeah! It's my summer dye-job, you like it? Yukari and I went and got our highlights done at the salon earlier this week." I preened a little.

"Well anyway back to the shopping. So then there was this other stall that was selling these dresses and skirts from singapore for like, dirt cheap, I found some damned good bargains! There was this one dress there full length skirt and everything, tres fashinable, for only a thousand yen! If you went to the mall to buy that same dress, and I saw it on display like two months ago, it cost you four times that. And they had this one jewelry stall there... here, look at this adorable bracelet I found... five hundred yen! Can you believe it? I talked him down from eight hundred..."

"Hey... Amano was it?" Allen asked.

"Yeah?" Amano called back from up front.

"Do they put these straps back here as a courtesy for the purpose of a man being able to strangle himself with dignity when faced with just this situation?" Allen inquired.

The guys all laughed but I didn't see what was so funny. I mean, you'd think they'd be interested... guys liked hunting. There was no more challenging form of hunting than hunting for a good bargain.

Freid was hot and humid but thankfully it wasn't as bad as the swamp... at least it didn't smell. The rice paddies were a comfortingly familiar sight. As Amano pulled into the gates of Godashim, their capitol, I noted that it looked like they had repaired most of the damage from the war. The city was really beautiful now that I looked at it; very ancient looking. I wondered idly exactly how old Freid was and realized that for all the time I'd spent on Gaea I didn't actually know a whole lot about it.

Well, I consoled myself, there had been a war going on after all. I'd had other things to worry about. I got a small shiver running down my spine at the vague reminder of the visions I had suffered here in this country. For some reason I had gotten my worst of all visions here in Freid. There had been one in which I had divined the truth of a doppleganger (a shapeshifter that could steal another person's form) and then foresaw his horrible death. I had entered his mind (I fully blame the weird hypnotic incense he used on me) and was inside of it when I saw how he would die. I can only surmise that the shock and trauma of being with him as his life was squeezed from him somehow stopped my heart. I was pretty wigged out for days after that, it felt like no-one understood me. And as if that weren't bad enough a few days later when the real attacks began I got another vision. This one didn't kill me but it was pretty bad all the same. I saw the current Duke of Freid die; it was awful! I mean, it was raining blood! _Blood_! I shuddered again.

"Something wrong Hitomi?" Allen asked concernedly. It looked like he'd seen me shiver.

"Just some bad memories," I replied. "I think the surroundings just reminded me of the last time I was here."

"You haven't... you know, had any visions have you?" Allen sounded a little nervous. I couldn't blame him, I was nervous too. I seemed to get the strongest of my visions here in Freid for some reason and I wasn't sure why.

"No," I said. "No visions, thank heavens. Please, don't jinx it."

He smiled a little at this and left me to my thoughts. I stared out the window at the people staring back at us, or more accurately at the "horseless carriage" we rode in. There were monks everywhere in this place! Monks and guards. It seemed like Freid specialized in two things, the preisthood and the military. Suddenly I froze and that hot-cold-prickly feeling swamped over me. Dammit! Not another one!

I saw again that weird green sickly-glowing light exploding into the sky and spreading out everywhere like a creeping miasma. The Zone of Absolute Fortune. Then I saw the world with glowing pink ribbons of light like veins interlacing all over its surface suddenly twist, then turn green, then finally fade into this strange green fog. Then another vision flashed directly after the first one; it was an antique mirror. Its solid gold frame was encrusted with jewels and it shone in a beam of pure white light from overhead, engraved on the back of it was a strange symbol kinda like a bendy-looking Y over a circle. Suddenly my vision zoomed outwards and I saw a cave with water on the floor. Then my Vision zoomed outward again, looking like I was being dragged backwards at an incredible speed. My vision went down under the water and backwards out into the open sky where it paused just long enough for me to see a coastline with a clifface carved into the shape of a winged being. Then my vision zoomed backwards once more, moving at such speed that the landscape was nothing more than a flickering blur of sea, then river, then forest, then canyon and I found my sight locked on the city I had just entered.

At last my freaky powers turned off again and I was brought back to myself. I hated it when those Visions just seized me like that; I always felt tired and lightheaded afterwards!

I eyed Allen with disfavor and said

"You jinxed it."

"What did you see?" he asked me. "No fire or attacks this time, right?"

"None, thankfully," I answered, feeling rather cheerful once the dizziness passed.

"All I saw was something about the Zone of Absolute Fortune and a cave with a mirror in it."

"A mirror?" Allen said, suddenly looking interested. I rolled my eyes inwardly, was this guy a total vanity king or what? There was no way I was going all the way to the back of beyond to fetch this guy a new mirror, he could buy his own.

"Yeah," I answered. "A mirror."

"What did it look like?" he asked.

"About yea-big," I approximated with my hands. "Jewel encrusted gold with a funny mark on the back of it."

"What did the mark on the back look like?" Allen asked interestedly.

I took out the note pad from the seat pocket in front of me and a pencil I'd stowed in the side-compartment and drew my best approximation of the symbol for him.

Allen frowned at it, took my pencil (after first trying to figure out the little lead thing and having me demonstrate how the eraser worked and remarking on the ingeniousness of it) and made a few changes.

"Is that it?" he asked. I looked at it; he'd gotten it down perfectly!

"Yep, that's exactly what it looks like. Why the interest?"

"Freid is the nation that guards the power spot here on Gaea, the place with the closest connection to the well-spring of power that pervades Gaea and makes it thrive. The religion of Freid is Draconian worship and the symbol on its flag is very similar to the one you've shown me."

I made a gesture that said louder than words "and the point of all of this is...?"

"Well I can't be sure but I think you may have stumbled across a real find here."

"Huh?" I asked, suddenly interested.

"My father as you know was a very avid archeologist and in his search for the location of Atlantis he came across many tomes of research; histories, scholarly papers, and tomes about long lost artifacts and legendary objects lost to time. I was going through the library on my estate and it's crammed with the historical remnants of his obsession. Celena and I flipped through one on one evening not too long ago; a book about long lost artifacts here in Freid and it mentioned a mirror."

"It did?" I said, intrigued in spite of myself. Spending all of my time grubbing around in the dirt excavating long lost junk didn't normally sound like my cup of tea but this was staring to sound interesting to me.

"Ah yes!" Dryden said enthusiastically, glasses on and cheerful look on his face. He'd apparently been listening in on our conversation and decided to lend his expertise.

"The legendary Mirror of Truth!" he continued. He was certainly very enthused. His whole character was animated; of course for a scholar of history like I knew Dryden to be, something like this would be all over his alley.

"What's the Mirror of Truth?" I asked, knowing very well that he wanted me to ask.

"As Allen said, the Freidians worship the Draconians," Dryden said. "And have for as long as the country has been around. The Mirror of Truth is said to have been a gift from the Black Dragon Clan, a group of powerful and mysterious Draconians who created the world of Gaea and then disappeared from history, to the very first Duke of Freid. It is said that no-one can lie within the presence of the mirror, and that anyone looking into the mirror is shown the Self and soul within. There's another version that says that anyone looking in the mirror is shown what they will one day become. The story has it that one of the long ago Dukes was so shaken by what he saw in the mirror when he looked in it that he ordered the mirror locked away and buried for all time."

"Oh," I said. Privately I kinda couldn't blame him; lord knew that I spent a lot of my time wishing that I didn't know the things about other people and myself that my powers told me. Trust me on this one people; sometimes, ignorance really is bliss!

By this point Millerna was leaning over listening into the conversation as well. The girl loved adventures, and the farther it took her away from her princess duties in Asturia the happier she was about it. The fact she got to hang around with Allen was usually a bonus; but this time around she didn't seem as enthused about it as she had last I traveled with her. I kinda wondered if they were fighting. I didn't want to butt in this time, lord knew I had made enough of a mess of it last time but when I looked at that spread I'd done for her back-when it kinda did show that Allen wasn't right for her. Well, actually it had shown that she needed to be happy with herself before she could love someone else, but the cards had also hinted that Allen might not be the one to set her cap for if she wanted to achieve this.

"Well, it was kinda buried," I said. "It could be that Mirror of Truth, or maybe just a clever knock off. Who's to say?" I dug into the snack bag and grabbed a bag of chips.

"Hey, anyone want a snack?" I offered. "We have all different flavors."

Allen and Dryden both kinda stared at me like I'd grown a second head. I looked down at my tummy to see if maybe they were thinking I was a little too much on the hefty side to be snacking on greasy potato chips but decided that they were wrong; I was an active girl with a high metabolism I could eat this bag without any problems. There were advantages to being in track after all. I popped a crisp salty morsel in my mouth and crunched down hard on my guilt. Ah! Youth!

"We're talking about the possible recovery of an ancient artifact that has been lost for hundreds of years," Dryden said. "And all you want to know about is if anyone want some of your strange packaged trail rations?"

"What's this possible recovery?" I asked, munching on a few more chips and debating on whether I wanted to pop in a DVD into the portable DVD player. Distractions were good, denial was better. This was not happening to me, this was not happening to me, this was not happening to me… again.

"Well you said you saw it," Allen pointed out.

"Yeah so?" I asked.

"So don't you want to go and look for it?" Dryden pursued.

Somebody wanted to go and look for it, but it wasn't me!

"Not really, " I said disinterestedly. "I'm on vacation. Last time I was here all I ever seemed to do was get scary visions of fire and death, run screaming for my life, and get my ass hauled all over the damn place all the time. All I'm thinking of is finding a great spot to pop up camp and enjoy a nice leisurely vacation on the beach. I intend to spend my days tanning in the sun or playing in the water and my nights drinking and partying! Sorry guys, adventure or not, grubbing about in the dirt in the middle of no-where is not my idea of a pleasant vacation."

That was my story and I was sticking to it. No I did not want to be the savior of Gaea, no I did not want to have any more adventures, I just wanted to be normal (or at least as close to normal as I was ever likely to see). So I was not going to worry, I was not going to stress; I was going to kick back, chill out, and resume my vacation.

Dryden seemed to pause and think that one over, his fingers were tapping against each other in what I was probably later going to realize as his "plotting mannerism" and the look on his face was definitely calculating. He flashed me a billion watt "insurance salesperson smile" and said

"Adventuring doesn't have to be a chore. It looks like you and your friends are already well prepared for a nice camping trip with all of the amenities. With me and my new fleet at your disposal we could turn this little outing of yours into a really fun time. Just think of it... all of the amenities of civilization on board the Sea Rose at your disposal, waiters, a cook, servants to set up and tear down for you; you'll barely have to lift a finger just enjoy your vacation and lead us to the spot in the process."

Hmm, put that way...

"Hey guys, you hear all that?" I called up front to my two comrades.

"Yeah, he's pretty good," Amano called back. They were both looking for a space to park. I was beginning to wonder what we were going to do when this thing ran out of gas; I mean, it wasn't exactly like on earth where there was a gas-station everywhere. "Sounds like fun to me, I could go for an adventure or two."

Please be careful what you ask for, I thought, wincing inwardly. If there was one thing this world was good at, it was supplying adventures. In fact it was rather too good at supplying adventures; I'd had my fill and then some the last time I was here.

The fact that I was probably here for a reason was something I was assiduously going to ignore for as long as I could. Of course, this quest for the Mirror in my Vision and the fact that all of the right players had been oh-so-conveniently gathered in just the right place at just the right time was one more neon-bright indication that whatever purpose I had been dragged here to accomplish was probably already being set in motion. I was going to ignore that too.

I will not worry, I will not stress; I will just relax... Relax, because that was all I could really do now. Trying to fight the universe when it has a particular notion in mind for you was a lot like trying to argue with a rainstorm; you could scream at it until you were purple but you were still going to get wet. So just relax, all things in the fullness of time. I was not going to pull any bad futures into place; I wasn't even going to think about the future. Just breathe and concentrate on the now.

"How about you, Yukari?" I asked. "You up for it?"

"Hell yes!" she said. "Adventure, exploring a strange new world for ancient lost treasures... and I get my very own butler! What could be cooler than this?"

Where would I be without my cheerful, outgoing other half? Count on Yukari to find the bright side.

"Yeah," I said, finally starting to like the idea a little. "We'll be like those idle rich nobles in the eighteenth century who put up expeditions into egypt to discover the treasures of lost kings. Sip sherry while the hired men dig around in the dirt and more power to 'em!"

"That's the spirit!" said Dryden.

"Hey Millerna," I said, turning to her. "Are you coming?"

I could see her battle with temptation written plainly on her face. Whehter she'd admit it or not, Millerna loved adventure. She had a real adventurers spirit and she thrived on challenges; but she was also a princess and her sister Eries was always on her to act a little more ladylike.

"I really shouldn't..." she said with cautious reluctance.

"Why not?" Dryden questioned immediately. He saw the longing on her face too; and I'd bet a fair sum that said he'd do just about anything to keep her from being unhappy. Plus there was the added benefit that, since this was his venture, if he could find a way for Millerna to come along chances were that he'd also get to spend some time with her. Away from Allen.

"Well I'm only here as a diplomatic envoy; it wouldn't be doing my princessly duty if I suddenly blew that off to go artifact hunting," she said a little dejectedly.

"Oh you won't be blowing anything off," Dryden assured her. "Expeditions like this take a little time to plan anyway if your ships aren't fully stocked for a journey already. Mine just got back from one, so the convoy will need a little time to resupply here in Freid. You can meet up with your convoy, do your princessly duty by attending Chid's birthday gala, and then take a little time off for a side-trip with us. Bringing back a long-lost artifact to Freid will probably be seen as a sign of good luck or something and it could help you cement good relations here."

Millerna wavered visibly.

"I'm not so certain that it's a good idea for Princess Millerna to be exposed to possible danger," Allen spoke up. I was about to join Yukari in jeering at him but unfortunately I was born with the annoying ability to see both sides of an argument. Allen had the responsibility of the safety of his Princess in mind; it was his sworn duty to protect her (whether or not she might actually need it or not). Letting her go haring off to the back of beyond on some mad quest didn't sound condusive to that particular mission.

"She won't be in danger," Dryden argued.

"We don't know what's out there," Allen argued back.

"Boys!" I cut in. "She's a big girl. That means she gets to make up her own mind."

Dryden immediately backed off; probably because he already knew which way she was going to swing. Millerna might be big on her princess duty but at the same time I could almost feel her chafing at all of the restrictions and when push came to shove she was very very stubborn. Allens objection had probably cemented her desire to go haring off. I could almost see it on her face.

"As long as Dryden's right and it won't interfere with my princessly duty," she said. "I don't see anything wrong with shaving off a few days from my trip. I could depart a little early and then after we find the artifact I'll tell Eries that we have to stay a few days late to celebrate the mysterious recovery of a long lost treasure."

Dryden didn't bother to hide his smugness, and Allen scowled at him for it.

"I hope you know what you're doing," Allen muttered. Spoil sport.

"Oh relax," I said pushing on his shoulder a little. "Look, if it makes you feel better, we'll all let you go charging in there first. You can secure the area to make sure it's safe and then the rest of us will follow you."

Allen looked a little mollified by this. Not much mind you, but a little.

"Brother..." Celena said hesitantly, speaking for the first time since we'd started this merry little road trip. "I want to go too."

"No Celena," he said gently. "As much as I hate to deny you anything, it's too dangerous. You'll be safer here in Freid or back in Asturia."

The poor thing looked so crestfallen I decided to help the poor girl out.

"What's wrong with Celena that she can't come along?" I demanded. Attack first and keep the man off guard, that was the way to manipulating Allen Shezar.

"There's nothing wrong with her," Allen snapped. "I just don't want her coming along on a quest that could put her into danger."

"Well what if she stayed on board the ship?" I pursued, trying to buy some time so I could work on him. "She wouldn't be in danger then."

"She's not going!" Allen said stubbornly, with finality in his voice.

Oh but the poor man had reckoned without Millerna Sara Aston, Princess of Asturia.

"What do you mean she's not going?" Millerna demanded. "Of course she's going, I simply cannot do without my Lady in Waiting."

A bold-faced lie of course, Millerna did just fine for herself but it was Gang Up On Allen Day here in Freid so we women folks all sort of had it in for him. Yukari and I objected to the whole "women are delicate and need to be protected" chivalry thing he had going on; and Millerna probably did too even if she didn't realize it yet. Dryden... well there could be one or two reasons for him; he might be jealous, but I was just betting that he was the kind of guy who'd push at somebody just to see how far he could go with it.

"She's my sister!" Allen all but yelped. Poor guy, everyone was picking on him today.

"She's still my attendant Lady," Millerna said implacably. "She swore oaths to me for her duties just as you did yours."

Allen had this look on his face that just said "Et Tu Brute!" Poor man.

"I won't have her subjected to that kind of-"

"Your opinion, Allen, is not required."

Millerna cut him off. I stood in awe! Last time I was here Millerna would have agreed with Allen if he'd told her that the Mystic Moon was made of blue cheese.

"Celena is coming with me. I realize that my duty to her as her Princess is to keep her safe too and I assure you I take it seriously. I'll make sure she doesn't fall into danger."

He shut up. His mouth was hanging open in shock. Millerna was going to have to smooth things over with him later somehow or he was going to spend the entire trip sulking; he'd probably call it brooding, but we women all knew what it was.

"Besides," Millerna continued. "I don't see the harm in letting the girl have an outing with the rest of us."

An outing? An outing was a shopping trip to the bazaar, not an expedition into the wilds to retrieve an artifact from a cave that, if this was to be anything like Indiana Jones, was probably booby trapped.

"Hey!" Millerna said abruptly. "There's my caravan! Or at least the one that was sent ahead a week ago with gifts and neccesities."

The vehicle suddenly pulled into a little cul de sac alongside a whole string of wagons and carriages with that sea dragon and sword symbol on it.

"Good," said Amano. "I'm definately ready to stretch my legs."

"Me too," Yukari seconded.

Amano clicked the automatic lock button and pocketed his keys after we all clamored out of the vehicle. It did feel good to stretch out! Comfortable or not, there was only so much time a person could spend sitting in one position before no sitting position was comfortable anymore. People were staring at us, obviously wondering what kind of odd foreigners were traveling with their princess in a carriage that moved without horses. The chirp that the SUV gave when Amano pressed the lock button probably convinced at least some of them that it was alive somehow.

I suddenly felt very much like a curiosity or an exhibit at a zoo; people were staring at me! I hated being the center of attention especially the kind where I got those wide-eyed stares. I looked down at myself, I'd probably have an easier time of it if I didn't look so foreign. The loose cotton capris and tank top that I had worn to be comfortable during what was only supposed to be a road trip to the mountains looked ordinary enough from my perspective but I could tell by the sideways glances I was getting from passersby that they were not considered ordinary in Freid.

"Hey," Yukari said, looking over at me and touching my arm. She could always seem to sense when I was nervous.

"Hitomi don't be worried, we're not supposed to fit in. We're from another world entirely and the people gawking at us like a bunch of slack-jawed yokels..." It was clear from the way she had pitched her voice to carry that that last was for the curious onlookers. "...Are expecting to see something out of the ordinary. They'd be disappointed if they didn't."

"I feel like a monkey in a zoo," I said, trying to act nonchalant and failing utterly.

"If you can't stop them from staring then give them something to stare at," Yukari said, posing a little obviously. I couldn't help laughing at her for it. "Revel in your foreign-ness!"

Ah, cheerful, outgoing Yukari. Where would I be without her? She could take what was, for me, and unbearably discomforting situation and find the fun side about it.

"Doesn't this make you nervous at all?" I asked. "We're on another world entirely, far away from home and family. Doesn't that bother you?"

"Nope!" Yukari said cheerfully. "That just means I can get away with more stuff and my mom will never find out! Just imagine all the fun we can have, parties, bar-hopping..."

"We are above the legal drinking age here," I admitted a little reluctantly.

"No shit! Alright!" Amano cheered. Yukari, predictably joined in. I sighed a little inwardly. Those two got into enough of a "good time" while they were still below the age; It was going to be so much worse when they had all restrictions removed from them.

It's nice that they have something to look forward to, I told myself encouragingly. As for myself I was trying to ignore the nagging tightening sensation I had in my gut. The thought of being so far away from my home was a disturbing one for me. Despite the fact that I would be moving on to college soon and thus, out on my own, I had been counting on the fact that I would still be going home on vacations and taking frequently on the phone. Being so suddenly just cut off did not sit well with me.

Don't worry. Don't worry, don't worry, don't worry. Don't worry! I ordered myself, taking deep breaths to gain some calm. Thinking about how far away I was going to be was definitely out of the question; it made me nervous and when I got nervous on this world bad things happened.

Okay Hitomi, just go with the flow. Don't worry about anything. Be more like Yukari, find the bright side and concentrate on that. 

I looked around us again. We'd apparently hit the trade center of the city because the streets were completely congested with loincloth-wrapped men hurrying this way and that, bearing goods or running unknown errands. It looked like the dock scene in the opening of Anna and the King. I stared hard for a moment at an actual rickshaw... complete with loincloth-wrapped man and a little monkey.

"Hey look Yukari!" I couldn't help pointing. "A rickshaw!" I reached into my purse and hauled out my digital camera for a picture.

"Oh! How quaint!" Yukari cried. "Hitomi get a picture of me in it!"

"Amano, get in beside her, I'll get you both," I said, holding up my camera. The two of them climbed in and I had to wait a few minutes in order to get a clear shot in all of the congestion. I managed two good ones. The man looked pretty puzzled when they climbed out and thanked him without wanting to go any where.

The Gaeans were naturally curious about my camera so I showed them how to zoom in and out and take pictures using the little screen and the button. I gathered everyone around for a quick picture to take home with me. I'd probably be taking a lot more of them in the course of events.

"Hitomi, are you coming with me?" Millerna asked, once the novelty of the camera wore off. "I know Chid would love to see you again."

"Sure," I said cheerfully. "As long as you've extended the invitation I'll take you up on it. I hadn't wanted to be rude by asking. I'd like to see Chid again too."

"I'll bet Chid isn't the one you're wishing to see," Allen said dryly with a significant look at me. He was talking about Van and we both knew it. Unfortunately, to my embarrasment, I completely blushed.

"Well..." I said shyly, rubbing the back of my neck.

I couldn't deny it; the thought of seeing my special someone had been hovering at the back of my mind with me studiously trying to ignore it. This world seemed to respond to my wishes and if it caught me at it I'd go up in that damned beam again. I was just going to concentrate all of my energies on enjoying myself and going with the flow; having as good a time as possible and seeing where it took me. And if it happened to take me to Fanelia, well...

I smiled to myself.

Thank-you everyone who has reviewed this story. F-zelda, Silver Blossom, Avelyn Lauren, and I want to give a big shout-out to Corran Nakatori (thanks for the tip about the rating) and Dying Plead (who has graciously offered to act as my beta). I hope you all enjoyed thischapter and know that there's going to be plenty more fun in the near future. As always, please read and review.

Nightheart.


	3. Chapter 3

I'd like to thank the people who have all reviewed thus far for their comments and helpful hints. Corran Nackatori, sorry about the mix up. Silver Blossom, Avelyn Lauren thanks again for visiting this chapter. And now without further ado, I bring you chapter three.

Millerna's entourage that had been sent on ahead consisted entirely of wagons, not a carriage to be found. So, we did the amusing and touristy thing and got some rickshaws to take us. I noted with some relief and some disappointment that I was the only one not sharing a rickshaw, which seated two. Yukari was with Amano, Allen with Celena, and Millerna with Dryden. I had one all to myself. My guide was a personable fellow, and if he had had a cell phone or contact number I would have kept his business; he knew all about the city and cheerfully pointed out landmarks and history with little anecdotes along the way to the palace.

Godashim was a very old city, steeped in cultural, religious, and historical significance. The castle had stood for hundreds of years, since the very first Duke Freid had built it at the end of his reign as a gift to his son who inherited the title and duties of the little duchy. Every year, the guide told me, the Zengu Clan came over from Fortona Temple and renewed their pledge to protect the temple to the Duke of Freid (but that was in spring, not summer). There was something so unique about seeing another place from the back of rickshaw, and I completely forgot to be depressed about my state of single blessedness.

Boy, were those palace guards surprised when princess Millerna Sara Aston and her entourage showed up in a dinky wicker rickshaw like a stray commoner. The look on their faces was indelibly captured in my trusty camera. We were told, with some embarrassment that they had been expecting Millerna's arrival considerably later so Duke Freid was in a meeting with his council. Millerna of course graciously assured them that there had been a strange (but unspecified) coincidence that had shortened her journey and she was sorry for the sudden inconvenience.

We were all shown to a large veranda overlooking an ornate garden and menagerie for lunch. Those potato chips hadn't made much of a dent in my growing appetite so I set to the strange cuisine with relish. No piscus gourds thank heavens. The foreigners of the group, in this case me, Yukari and Amano, were a little dubious about some of the things we couldn't recognize so I wound up eating a lot of saffron rice and bean paste. Hopefully it wouldn't come back to haunt me later.

Me, Yukari, Celena and Millerna took this opportunity to freshen ourselves up from our travel-shlumpy selves. Millerna said we were going to be appearing in Court and I took that to mean that we were to look presentable. Right now I was looking... Comfortable. Yukari always looked great, but she too had dressed down for the trip out to the mountain retreat so it was time to change. Millerna chose one of her ruffly pink numbers that really screamed Paris Hilton, and Celena, sadly, chose to match her. I was going to dress for the temperature personally, because even inside the palace the sweltering heat of the Freidian climate did not entirely dissipate. I picked out a refreshing thin cotton light blue top that v-necked kimono style with a two inch band band of silver grey satin just under the breasts that tied in the back. The bottom part of the shirt was loose and airy to enable breathing. The skirt I wore with it was a dressy-casual three-quarter length pressed cotton in a deep grey-blue with a pattern of climbing roses stitched up the side in silver thread. Yukari had chosen a spaghetti strap top in ivory silk with a matching brown pleated knee-length skirt in faux-suede (it was actually cotton).

After lunch we were all shown to the throne room where Chid was ready to receive his guests. Millerna greeted him formally as one ruler to another and they made with royal pleasantries for a few minutes, wishing one another's respective nations a fruitful harvest and a bountiful trading season yada yada yada. Then Millerna wished her little nephew a happy birthday and informed him that she had a surprise for him. So now they were speaking as people and not countries; an important distinction to make to be sure.

Chid was pleased to see Allen again and happy to meet his sister Celena; as soon as he could do so politely he greeted me with enthusiasm. Sweet little tot; I always had had a soft spot for the little boy. He was like a sweeter, much more polite version of my own little brother. He wanted to know how I'd gotten here and how long I was going to stay so I told him I'd been kidnapped by the pillar of light again and plunked here and I wasn't sure how long I was going to stay but I'd be sure to make time for him when he wanted to see me as long as I was in his country.

Then Millerna, just remembering, told Chid about my vision and our agreed upon quest to go and bring back the Mirror of Truth to the Duchy of Freid. He was immediately overjoyed about the news, his face lit right up.

"As the duke of Freid," he announced. It was so cute seeing him make an announcement too; his cherubic face got all cute and serious as he tried to deepen his little boys piping soprano into deep and serious tones. Too adorable, I just wanted to walk up there and hug him for being too cute for words!

"I must accompany this mission to recover this long lost treasure of my ancestors for the honor of my duchy and family name," he said.

That set the cat among the pigeons let me tell you. His court immediately burst into an uproar about the announcement and the ten councilors ringed to either side of his throne immediately started babbling at once.

Bored by this I flipped on my Othersight. It was a strange little knack to my powers, not quite like having a vision. For one thing, I could control it and for another it didn't show me the past or the future or things in the present that were far away, but gave me another layer of perception into what I was seeing now. It showed me auras, glowing manifestations of a persons soul that overlaid their physical bodies like a light-up swirl of color. The auras, if I read them accurately, could tell me what a person was feeling at that moment; whether they were lying or telling the truth, whether they were fearful or angry or sad and hiding it. Over the past year I'd gotten better at reading them and thus I had gotten better at figuring out the things people really meant by what they said and did not say.

I'd never been particularly observant before, especially when I was trying hard not to be. My powers had forced maturation upon me whether I wanted it or not, forcing me to figure things out. Then my own inner nature forced me to try to help people once I figured out that something wasn't spot on. Over the last year I'd gotten a whole lot better at mediating peace between members of a group. I'll admit that a lot of this was self interest, I still wasn't proficient at blocking other peoples emotions from outside of me and if someone was strongly resentful it grated on my nerves like nails on a chalkboard.

This group in front of me was a real tangle! The only one who seemed to be open or honest about anything was Chid. Well, I suppose that was politics for ya. They were probably just your average patch of politicians, many of them worried about prestige and how to get the largest slice of the pie for their own group of people. I recognized the next Plaktu (well to be perfectly accurate, _current_ now; next after the previous one met a bad end due to Doppleganger interference) by his priests robes and that enormous necklace of prayer beads he wore. I tried not to shudder in remembered horror. I'd seen the last one die rather terribly after all.

Chid let the debate rage for a bit, obviously not certain how he was supposed to stop it, he just kinda sat there on his throne looking at his court try to decide his decision for him. I got the very distinct feeling that this was a common occurence. Chid had told me that he was going to be an adult and a great duke like his father the previous duke of Freid, but despite his best Chid was still a little boy and he had a long way to go towards manhood. I could sense the attitude in the room that these councilors he was surrounded by looked at the young Duke sitting more in than on the cushions of his throne and saw a little boy whose decisions should all be made for him.

I checked with my Othersight once more and confirmed it. They were all really debating not over whether the Duke should be allowed (as if it was their choice in the first place!) to go on this mission, but on who should go in his place and be the once to claim the prestige of returning such a valuable artifact to the little duchy.

Chid heard it too and didn't see any way to stop them. He probably already knew that they were going to tell him that it was too dangerous and he was too young.

I nudged Millerna.

"Hey, you're the royal," I hissed. "Do something! Surely his Auntie Millerna has the authority to butt in!"

Millerna shrugged her shoulders helplessly.

"I can't interfere in matters of the Dukes own court save through my influence with the Duke," Millerna whispered back. "It would set a bad precedent."

Well, there went that. I looked over at Allen, signaling with a significant look that he should do something. He reluctantly shook his head and nodded significantly toward Chid. Right, the poor little boy had to carry all of his burdens. Well dammit, that wasn't fair at all! These people should be nurturing and supporting him into becoming a great duke, not snatching away all of his power and treating him like a puppet! I just thanked all the powers in creation that a truly evil person had never come to his court and gotten his ear. It could very well have led to the kind of things that you read about in stories.

I'm definitely a foreigner, I thought nervously. But they can't arrest me without the consent of the Duke. It almost certainly was not my place to butt in but I wanted to help Chid. He was so young and sweet and it looked like he didn't really have any friends or mentors at all, just people leeching onto him and stealing all of his power. My instincts were shouting at me to do something. I had learned to trust them. Whether or not I got kicked out of Freid for butting in where I didn't belong; I had to help the poor little boy. I took a deep breath to center my self, bolstered my courage and activated one of my Gifts.

"You SHALL be Silent!" I Commanded.

One of my special abilities was, as I've said, the Command Voice. A voice in ringing tones with all of my power behind it that instilled instant obedience in anyone who heard it. The noise in the room cut off as if with a knife.

"Duke Chid zar Freid is your liege," I said a bit more quietly into the stillness. I wasn't precisely using Command Voice, but I was leaning on their consciences with my powers, reminding them with twinges of guilt where their real duty lay.

"You owe him your obedience if not your cooperation," I continued, straightening my spine and turning my head to meet the gaze of all the courtiers present.

My heart was pounding, absolutely racing. I hated being the center of attention despite my drive to compete! Yukari was the outgoing one and I the demure, shy one. I did not like being in the spotlight, especially a hostile spotlight; but in this case I had no choice but to stand my ground. My two best friends were looking at me in plain shock, never having witnessed me be so outgoing.

"He has announced to you all that he will accompany us to retain his family honor," I said. "Your arguments should not be over whether or not he will go, but how you can assist him so that he may return safely."

I released my power hold on them and sat back a trifle, signaling that I was done speaking. Silence reigned for a moment more, just long enough for one of the more pompous of the courtiers (who looked ready to suffer a fit of apoplexy) to rally himself for an attack. Before he could speak however another voice intervened, a small sweet little boys voice.

"Hitomi is correct," Chid said, his voice firming. "My father would not allow such an important decision to be overturned and, though I may be young, I still rule here in Freid. How could I face him in Elysia if I let all of my kingdoms final decisions be made by others?"

"Your Grace," the pompous one said smoothly. "You should consult and ponder this matter before you-"

"If I consult and ponder I will do nothing," Chid said firmly.

"But your Grace," another protested. "How will Freid manage without you here?"

"The same way it has been managing for entirely too long," Chid replied, I actually heard a little stele creep into his voice. Alright little man! It sounded like he was coming to a conclusion or two on his own.

"In my place I leave Freid to be stewarded by Plaktu," Chid said. "He is my voice in all matters until my return. This court is adjourned."

He raised his wand of office and then promptly rose and left the room. I filed out with the other guests, the looks that many of the courtiers gave me were positively venomous. Their days of free power were numbered and they well knew it now. Chid was growing apace and it would not be long at all before he achieved his full majority at fifteen and seized all of his authority by right. Heh, served 'em right too.

Still, I couldn't help but feel a little concerned about Chid himself. He was still just a young boy and he had all of these heavy responsibilities thrust upon his young slim shoulders. It wasn't right. Little boys should get the chance to be little boys, interact with and play with people their own age, hide slugs under girls' pillows and other little boy activities.

He spends for too much time around other adults; it's not healthy, I decided. I'd speak with Dryden about possibly finding a child or two Chid's own age to come with us, he could hire them as a cabin boy or something. As far as I was concerned, this vacation had just been extended as a charity to a little boy desperately in need of some time out from under everything.

I caught Dryden on his way out and told him my idea; predictably he was way ahead of me.

"Wow Hitomi!" Yukari said when we were out of direct earshot of almost anyone but close acquaintances. "Where did all of that come from? Usually getting you to put yourself forward is like pulling teeth, but you were owning all of that up in here."

"I had to do something," I said, shrugging in embarrassment.

It appeared that once again, Gaea was changing me, making me step outside of myself, whether I liked it or not. I resolved that I wasn't going to think about it overly much. I was not going to worry. I pleaded exhaustion and asked to be shown to a room. It was the same one I'd had last time I'd been here. Yukari and Amano were still fresh however and announced they were going back to bring in the car and our personal gear.

I plopped down into the springy futon and closed my eyes to sleep. I knew no more until the light had already faded completely into dawn when I re-awoke.

I didn't intrude on his court again but spent the next few days doing this and that. The day after I spent a pleasant afternoon touring the city by rickshaw with my two best friends while Dryden and his PA got a few of his chosen ships outfitted for the expedition. Millerna and Celena spent the time in meetings hammering out a new treaty involving rice or something, I wasn't terribly interested in the details. Allen stayed with them as he was Millerna's escort. I got a lot of really cool pictures of the Freidian architecture and some of the more notable spots throughout the city.

Their city and architecture was very open; the sub-tropical climate probably aided that. If I lived in a house without air conditioning, I'd try anything I could to keep cool too. I learned from my guide that the buildings were not only built to catch those rare cooling breezes in the summer but also to attempt to keep reasonably dry during their winter monsoon season. I'd heard of such a thing in the subcontinent of India on Earth; from what I'd seen on television the rains fell for weeks on end, unceasingly, like a waterfall from the sky and flooded the streets. I understood now another part of the reason why the city was in the middle of irrigated rice paddies; it wasn't just to supply the food to the city itself but also to have a practical place to shunt the water of the great rains as they were called.

We were poor travelers but I and my friends found the people incredibly warm an open. We passed through the great gardens in the center of the public market were we found a group of players with drums, some very odd-sounding pipes, and a harp-lute-guitar thingy that made a strange foreign sound. They were playing for a group of women practicing some kind of complicated dance dressed in native costume; many layers of silk wrapped many times around them, belted with wide, heavily embroidered sashes the ends left free over the shoulders and around the waist to catch the breezes. It very faintly resembled pictures I'd seen of sarongs but it had its own uniqueness. They laughingly invited us to join in and learn a few steps; Yukari was all for it of course and dragged me in too, but it was surprisingly fun. I got pictures. Being a tourist and immersing ones self in the culture was amazing. Maybe traveling wasn't so bad after all. If I could just remember not to worry so much, I found that I could relax and enjoy myself.

I wanted to shop in the bazzaar for the incredibly detailed works with ivory and jade they had, plus the jewelry and the spices, and some of the exotically embroidered textiles but I only had yen and they took some weird Gaean coin called a girdai, or special coins minted in Freid with the Duke's picture on them. I sighed a little at that and reluctantly restrained myself, probably better this way; once I started spending it was hard to make myself stop and I didn't know how long I was going to be on Gaea.

After that I spent the rest of the afternoon getting my exercise. My whole family is athletic, my father likes te-kwon-do (he's a fifth degree black belt and has been studying it since he was very young) My mother places every year in naginata-do competitions across Japan. They instilled their love of activity in their two children, although I could tell they were a little disappointed when we chose more modern-day sports over the traditional athletics they favored. My little brother loves basketball right now.

Much to Yukari's disappointment I wasn't in track anymore. She should have known it would happen sooner or later; I do thrive on challenge after all. My room is full of medals, ribbons, and trophies from the athletic events I've attended over the years and not just for track either. When I was a little girl my mother and I were in a mother-daughter naginata-do club. Later on in junior high it had been gymnastics I'd loved. Then when I got into high school my interests had changed to Track.

My new love is martial arts. My father had insisted that I join his dojo after hearing everything that happened to me on Gaea. After all, what father wants his daughter to be helpless? At first after he signed me up over my protests I went only grudgingly; I mean, despite it coming from Japan I wasn't big into martial arts. In fact I looked at it as being rather lame. Despite its active nature there just wasn't the same high in it that I got from running; perfecting my form and breathing wasn't, to me, a fun way to spend my time.

It was active, but active enough for me. Reluctantly my father decided to try a different way; he contacted one of his martial arts friends to let me try a kind of new-style western-type martial art called "kickboxing." One try was all it took for me. I got the muscle toning and cardiovascular workout that I liked to maintain my trim figure, worked up a good sweat, and I learned to spar and defend myself. It was a bit like track in the sense that I used my legs a lot (and they were already very well-muscled from my time in track) and when I was sparring I got that sense of competition, of wanting to be the best, which led to a natural sort of runner's high. The challenge of track had been lagging anyway and I completely devoted myself to my new pursuit and passion, that being martial arts. I had gotten my friend Yukari to join up along with me so we both went to the gym regularly to work out and practice sparring.

I had even attended a few of the beginner competitions and placed.

My father could not be more pleased that at least one of his children was "following in his footsteps", sort of, anyway. I wasn't actually in his class but I did on occasion sit in on lessons with him. Taekwon-do was very different, it concentrated mainly in holds and throws rather than on punches, kicks and blocks but at it base the two disciplines were similar enough (although they took different approaches) that there was not too much of a learning curve. I figured, why limit myself to one particular style when it might not always fit the situation? I made it a point to stretch out with him and work some of the forms together at least once a week, usually in the evenings after he came home from work. Father-daughter bonding.

I'd been at it for a year and had participated in three competitions, placing in two of them. I favored traditional-style competitions to the "opens" from the west, too much concentration on looking good on the surface and not enough emphasis on what I felt was the real value in martial arts... respect. If I wanted to have a chance at taking second or first this year in the regional winter games I'd have to keep my edge up.

I talked Yukari into being my sparring partner for a while and the two of us spent the afternoon practicing the newest form to make certain that my muscles remembered it and mostly sparring against each other. Then we got to toss Amano around for a bit, he was in kendo and took it in good part that we needed someone heavier and stronger to test against. We attracted a small crowd of palace servants and guards by the end of it, many of them remarking with puzzlement over a man who would let a girl defeat him time after time. Apparently women fighters weren't exactly common in Freid.

The day following that was the day before Chid's birthday and it occurred to me (duh why didn't I realize it before?) that I didn't have a present for him. Well what does one get a duke? My MP3 player would make a novel present, but would become useless once the batteries ran out (and this thing went through them pretty quickly. SO that was out. The jewelry and clothes I'd just brought in Chinatown were for girls and not really suitable. I pondered for a moment and then booted up my laptop; the batteries were fully charged thank goodness. I downloaded the pictures in my digital camera (being carful to save them to back up disc) and then hooked my picture port into my USB. I'd brought two packages of the special paper for it too (just in case I should want to exchange pictures with someone before I went back home). So I riffled through the pictures until I found a good one that Yukari had taken of me and little Chid standing at the entrance of his palace in front of that lion statue and quickly printed it out before my batteries could run down.

I thought it would be a simple matter of getting some glass and wood to make him a frame when I discovered that panes of glass were a rare commodity in this pre-industrial world. So I sighed a bit and settled for just the wood. He could put glass in it later if he wanted to. I was pleased; I'd signed my name and a wish for a happy birthday in an empty corner. It would make a good present.

The next day was the big event. There were so many people there that the event had to be held outside in the immense royal gardens. Chid was sat upon a low cushioned throne while one attendant held up a shade to keep the sun off and another fanned him with a big grass-woven fan like out of an old picture of an Indian Rajah. Of course I had to get a picture of that! The line of guests sent to bestow their gifts and good wishes upon the Duke was really, really long and they all had these big fancy bejeweled gifts. I'd just give him mine later.

I had been at a loss for what I should wear to such a formal event that morning; I mean, should I try to fit in and dress like Millerna and Celena were dressed or should I dress like myself? One look at the pepto bismol dress with ruffles from here to mexico that Millerna offered to me was enough to decide it... I love Millerna like a sister, truly, but that girl has some very questionable taste in clothes! Besides that, the dresses they wore, even though they were of light fabrics, consisted of several layers of petticoats, a corslet, and a final silk over-gown. No way was I wearing that many clothes in the summer in the sub-tropics! No. Way.

Yukari, that fashionista clothes horse, came riding to my rescue thank heavens. I had brought clothes for a summer camping trip and I had bought that silk china-dress in Chinatown but neither of them seemed suitable to the occasion which was more on the formal side of semi-formal. Yukari came through for me though. Hip-hugging grey (you don't want to wear black in heat like this!) cotton-rayon slacks with a wide low-slung belt of silver disks linked together that hung diagonally down one hip. A saphire blue spaghetti-strap halter-top covered by a sheer blue-green-teal patterned caftan that tied gi-style right over left with wide butterflied sleeves to flutter in the breeze. Final touches with silver and turquoise jewelry completed the look.

Yukari was going asian-stlye too with a medium-brown satin shirt with kanji embroidered in silk on it that had a cut out breast panel in the front and a high neck collar that buttoned closed in front with an amber carbochon and gold button. She was wearing brown slacks that cut off at mid-calf and a belt of gold link. The shirt cut off just at the waistline offering the occasional glimpse of belly when she moved in a certain way.

We'd look very foreign indeed at that party; we were two blades of slim femininity with slacks cut to accentuate our curvy legs and hips and shirts that were unashamedly built to keep us cool. I felt I was making a great sacrifice by bowing to thier ideals of modesty and wearing slacks, had I it my way I'd be wearing shorts cut off just this side of decency to help keep me cool in a long afternoon in the sweltering sub-tropics.

We joined Millerna and Celena in their suite to finish getting ready for the party that afternoon. Millerna expressed her jealousy over our clothes and said that she wondered if she might start a fashion trend for them in Asturia. I told her that if nothing else, they were exotic. Thus we spent a delightful morning doing things that we love to do anyway; social grooming. I'm good with nails and I don't go anywhere without my basic kit (trust me on this, Amano argued long and hard with me about it!). Yukari likes to paint faces; and I never cease to be amazed at how wide an array of color for every complexion can be fit in to so compact a case. Even Millerna had nothing on Yukari's assortment.

Yukari and I did Celena and Millerna's hair and make-up while we gossiped about this and that and just had ourselves a girly good time.

At the fete I was attracting stares, Yukari and I both were but at least she could hang off Amano's arm. I got to bear my foreign-ness in solitude. I'll never in all of my life forget serving myself a glass of punch at the table with my back to the crowd and hearing one guy remark ingenuously "I think it's a woman!" like it was a mystery to him just what kind of creature would look like this. To which his friend replied "With curves like that my lad, it had better be a woman!" Okay, I felt a little better. It was nice to get complimented, however indirectly, on having a fine figure that I worked hard to maintain.

Fed up at being stared at like some curiosity in a zoo I decided it was time for a walk by myself. That was when i was struck broadside by another vision. The duke was receiving some kind of urn of something from some foreign dignitary when suddenly about three fourths of the palace body-guards surrounding the Duke changed forms and attacked. They were Dopplegangers, and their target was the Duke! I saw him run through by one of the dopplegangers and watched with horror as his young innocent face went slack with death. I saw Allen charge them all in a rage and despite accounting for three of the dopplegangers was overpowered and his head swiftly severed from his shoulders.

I fell to my knees, gasping in horror. At least it had taken me in time to warn someone. I rose to my feet.

"Hitomi?" Allen asked, looking concerned. "Are y-"

"Chid! Dopplegangers! It's an ambush!" I pelted off and heard Allen curse behind me and swiftly start off after me.

"They'll kill him!" I explained to Allen as we both made for the clearing where Chid was receiving his visitors.

"Just point them out to me," Allen said reaching for his sword.

We both burst into the clearing as the urn-bearers were stepping up to be next in line. My othersight revealed the true faces of the dopplegangers and which ones were truly guards. One of the dopplegangers was covertly reaching for his weapon to draw it on little Chid under the pretense of looking menacing at the gift-bringer.

"That one!" I cried pointing. Allen was on him in an instant, drawing his sword and slicing open the throat of the offending doppleganger in one fluid motion.

"Sir Allen?" Chid asked uncertainly as he stared at the face of one of his loyal guardsmen expiring on the ground.

The part was a tableau of shock for a few moments as the doppleganger died on the lawn. It was all explained when the creature revealed his true face upon his death.

Then all hell broke loose. The changed Dopplegangers, their mission revealed, assumed their true forms so that they would not kill one another and started making for the duke in a huge wave of sharp pointy objects. Allen stood with his sword drawn between Chid and all enemies, but his sister was quickly taken hostage by one particularly perceptive and enterprising Doppleganger. Before he could become torn by which of his blood he should save I snatched up the Duke and pelted for the dense leaf-cover of the gardens, calling to Allen to save his sister.

With Chid bouncing on my hip I poured on my best speed to escape any pursuit. Despite the wealth of guards in and around the palace that I had observed previously there suddenly seemed to be none when I needed them and pursuit was not long in coming. I was following a narrow twisting track and getting smacked in the face by the dense sub-tropical foliage. My guide in the city had told me that the palace gardens were like one enormous hedge-maze that an ancestor to the duke had ordered erected that had never been solved before. It was in current days and overgrown jungle of a hedgemaze that probably didn't actually have an answer anymore. Great!

"Chid!" I panted. "Where are we?"

"A dead end," he said in dismay as I pushed past a particularly obnoxious palm tree and nearly ran smack into a stucco wall overgrown with vines and greenery, very romantic looking but not helping me any. The path had been leading to a lovely little run-down private gazebo in front of a little pond wedged in the corner between two walls on my left. I glanced panickedly in either direction; my right was (sort of) open but my left had a corner and another wall going along my left hand side. Well, right it was I guess. I pivoted right and crashed back into the greenery, hearing the sounds of pursuit crashing through the foliage behind me.

Chid was getting really heavy in my arms, and keeping up this kind of speed for any length of time (especially while carrying a little eight-year old) was very difficult. I was a sprinter, not a distance runner! But the sound of machete's smacking through the little mini-jungle and the curses of the men in hot pursuit of us swiftly reminded me that I had better keep it up and not complain. If they managed to catch up with me...

I knew I couldn't keep up this pace indefinitely and there was no telling whether or not I'd be able to get help before I ran out of energy. If they caught me and I didn't have the strength to fight back, Chid was dead and so was I.

I came upon another clearing with another of those damned decorative walls. There was a large tree on the right hand side and a patch of bamboo on the left forming a natural cul-de-sac. A dead end, possibly in the literal sense of the words. I couldn't go back and around the other sides because the foliage at the mouth of the clearing was so thickly packed together on either side that it would take considerably more than a machete to open a passage large enough for a person to pass through. The sounds of pursuit drew a little nearer, I could hear the fore-runner crashing through the underbrush. There was no choice... I had to stand my ground and fight.

I lowered Chid down from my hip and set him on his feet.

"Chid," said. "Climb up into that tree and stay there."

"But Hitomi-" he started.

"_Now,_ little man!" I snapped, taking the same tone with him as I did with my little brother when he was being recalcitrant.

"Oh," I said as an afterthought, stripping off that pretty, fluttery, top that was going to get in my way. "Take this up with you. I borrowed it from Yukari and I don't want it getting messed up."

He looked worriedly at me but reluctantly did as I told him to. There was one small mercy about this particular spot to make a stand; the bottleneck was only large enough for one man to pass through at a time. That meant that I would be facing only one opponent at a time.

I breathed and prepared myself to fight for my life. I'd been in danger before, but always Van or Allen had been there to do the fighting. I'd fought before but that had been only in competitions where the bouts were strictly monitored to prevent real injury. This was the real thing. These people wanted to kill me. This was the sort of thing martial arts was invented for but no-one taking the class in this day and age ever thought they would actually need it for. My heart was pounding from more than just the run and my stomach was a knot of fear. I forced my self past it and took up a stance, watching that opening like a cat at a mousehole.

My othersight clicked on and in my nervousness I couldn't seem to switch it off. There was one benefit to it however, the rest of the physical world seemed to fade to sort of a grey-ish color and I could see the first doppleganger lit up bright as a christmas tree through the brush. A good deal away there were other small lights flickering in and out of the trees and I realized that I knew exactly where they all were. Their differing speeds at running and their fight with the greenery had spread them all out! Well, that was another small mercy, I'd definitely be facing them one at a time.

Then, the time to prepare myself was over. The first man showed up at the entrance to the valley, saw me and suddenly the world blurred around me. It was like it was all happening in slow motion. My othersight showed me his next move! A pale blue ghost of the attacker came at me, left foot forward, with his sword raised high to slice downward into me. Almost without thinking (because this was one of the classic moves we were taught to fight against) my body moved into his. I saw a strange glow of red high throat, like a target and instinctively my elbow struck his throat as I grabbed his sword-bearing wrist and torqued my waist. He went down over my hip. Before he could react one way or another I pinched his tendon to release his grip on the machete, whipped it into my grasp, and with another wrench pommeled him with the... well, pommel. I heard the cartilage of his nose crunch and briefly wondered if what my sensei had told me was true; that if you hit the nose hard enough you could send cartilage shooting up into the brain.

The fact that his aura, formerly lit up pale blue and red, faded to grey as his eyes rolled backwards kinda confirmed it. I didn't stare in horror; the adrenaline pumping into my system didn't leave room for horror. I shoved the body out of the way and turned to face the hole once again. I kept the machete, even though I didn't know how to use one. The style I studied was Empty Hands not Bokudo (Style With Weapons) but my sensei, who had studied weapons, said that Empty Hands was the base for learning weapons. I was sure I could think of something to do with it. If nothing else it meant that I had something to block their weapons with.

The next attacker came and I got another quasi-vision of his opening movement. He was going to come at me low, like a charging bull, in order to overpower me. He had a long pike with a blade mounted on top of it that would ram right into me. I took my stance waiting, holding for the last possible moment. He charged at me, I dropped. I came up under him, grabbed his staff and twisted his heavy ass over my slim little hip. I was lucky, he was way, way bigger than me and if he hadn't decided to charge and let me use his force against him I'd have been screwed. As it was I stabbed him in the back with the pike before he could recover. Yes, I stabbed him in the back. You're damn right I stabbed him in the back. You think I'm going to let him recover? Not likely.

It was a simple fact that girls are built physically less muscled than boys. It could be overcome of course but I'm going to put it out there; females are subconsciously raised with the idea that we're victims. A lot of the violent crimes are indeed performed by men statistically speaking so perhaps there's some truth to that. Because of this most fighting styles geared towards the "fair sex" emphasize a swift defeat by using the body's weaknesses to incapacitate or kill the opponent as quickly as possible. The adams apple, the nose, the eyes, the sternum, the soft under-belly, the balls... target any of those and you'll distract the attacker with pain long enough for you to take him out. Realistically, I only had one shot. If I didn't want to end up dead I'd have to find a way to take him out in the first few seconds of engagement. Knowing the move they were going to make seconds before they actually made it was a big help.

I didn't have time to do much more than use the pike to push the corpse out of the immediate vicinity before I had to turn and face the next guy. I struck first, using the pike that had been so marvelously effective on the first to come in under the next guy's guard and stab clear through his torso to the quillions. With a mighty heave, I deposited that one off to one side and out of my way, unfortunately, the pike snapped and I was left only with the short-range machete. The fourth one came shortly thereafter. Great, they were starting to come with less time to beat the first before I was attacked by the next. Where the hell was my cavalry!

I don't know anything about swords, I thought. Something about charging aggressively, Balgus had scolded Van about it. Come at an opponent like you mean to kill them right? They were certainly doing that to me. I didn't want to charge at them, that wasn't my style of fighting at all. Better to stick with my training and what I knew worked.

So I waited, stood my ground and waited for the next imbecile to come charging at me. When I moved in to clothesline him however he changed tactics and grabbed my wrist, jerking hard to knock me off balance. I automatically sunk my weight and held my ground. He pulled my arm up around my head and tried to throw me over his back But I sidestepped and twisted then sunk low again and (just as I had in track) blasted off from my braced position to push him backwards into the ground. He rolled back and onto his feet. Shit! Now I really had to face him.

The guy was armed and it looked like my window of opportunity was shut. He was still blue however which meant that I could see his next move. I held my own machete before me like I had seen Amano do in kendo. There was suddenly a red splotch on his side, like a glowing red target. I swung the enormous pointy metal thing at it and heard him scream as it hit. The blue apparition superimposed on the man sliced sideways from the left at me and I moved my metal stick to block it. There was a clang as our two swords crashed into each other and the impact was so hard my teeth rattled. I saw the blue shadow move to the left so I stepped to the right to keep him in front of me. The shadow moved forward and I saw another red blotch appear, this time it was a vital area. I couldn't hesitate. He moved, and so did I. At the last minute he shifted though, and our swords clanged again, the red blotched jumped over to his belly and I swung my sword clumsily downward, trying not to knock myself off balance. it hit. I pushed forward and the blade sank into him. Blood splurted at me from the wound I'd opened in his belly and it poured from his mouth too as he fell to his knees and then forward, falling on his own sword and the machete I'd been using.

Great. I'd gotten blood all over the outfit I'd borrowed from Yukari. The pants, I knew, had been forty hundred yen and the shirt and been fifteen hundred yen. There was no way I'd be able to wash this off, I thought distantly. Psychology told me that my mind was concentrating on trivialities to keep from thinking about what I'd just seen and done.

"Hitomi!" a familiar voice called. It was Amano... or maybe it was Allen. It was one of the two.

"Over here!" I called, my voice sounding muffled over the buzzing in my ears. I was staring numbly at the corpse at my feet. It was Allen who rushed over, sword drawn.

"I've been looking every where for..." He stopped, standing still for a moment, his sharp gaze taking in the four other bodies dragged off to the side of the clearing.

"Are you alright? Not hurt?" He quickly and expertly patted me down (in a non-groping kind of way) to ascertain that I was sound.

"I... I'm fine," I managed shakily. "Just a little shaken. Chid, you can come down now."

The little boy clamored down from the tree and bolted right for me clinging about my waist.

"I'm sorry!" he sobbed. "I'm so sorry!"

That startled me out of the hazy fog of shock was drifting into now that I was safe.

"For what?" I demanded, puzzled.

"I'm the Duke," he sobbed. "And I couldn't do anything to protect you! I'm supposed to protect you and I couldn't..."

That poor, _poor_ little boy. All those responsibilities, all that pressure. Everyone just piled these unrealistic expectations on him that there was no way he could fulfill.

"Ohhhhh, honey," I soothed, kneeling down to hug him. I tilted his face up to look at me.

"I want you to listen to me carefully Chid. There was _nothing_ you could have done." I said, surprised at my feirceness. "Those men were grown men and even though you're the Duke, you're still a little boy. There was _no_ _way_ you could have fought them and won. Do you hear me? You did the right thing."

Looked fiercely at Allen, all but ordering him to back me up on this. Telling little boys unreasonable things like "only cowards run away" would do possibly irreparable damage to his little psyche. Allen was already nodding however and he swiftly added his reassurances to mine.

"She's right, young duke," Allen said gently. "You are Freid and without you this Duchy would cease to exist. Your responsibility is to survive. If you had tried to stand and fight these men you would have been killed. You did the right thing in letting an adult handle it."

I'll admit I was gratified to hear him call me an adult; on my world I still had another few months or so to go until I could legally be called that.

"But..." he quavered. "But Hitomi's a girl!"

I couldn't help it, I laughed. He sounded so mortified. At least he hadn't accused me of having cooties. He was probably just embarrassed at being a boy and having been saved and defended by a girl, little boys were like that. I ruffled his hair affectionately.

"Yes I am," I said.

"Which probably worked to your advantage," Allen mused out loud. "I don't think those guys were expecting a girl to put up such a good fight, especially considering how fast you ran away. They probably thought they were getting an average nursemaid; a fast runner but ultimately useless in a confrontation."

I thought about being offended but decided he had a point. The standards of this world probably didn't have many female warriors.

"I'm glad I decided against the dress," I said. "I would never have been able to move in those stupid skirts you dress your women up in on this world." I was needling Allen with the open distain I placed on poor backward Gaea for inferior fashions. Maybe now he'd get off Millerna's case about her pants. Allen said nothing however and the three of us started back to the site of the main event.

Things were an uproar, people milling about trying to verify identities, and the Freidian court trying to interrogate three of the Dopplegangers who had been caught on the spot. There were many people out combing the gardens for the duke and a good many cried of relief that he was found safe and unharmed. They all started babbling at him at once, some crying for him to smooth things over with the envoy's some crying for him to execute the captured dopplegangers on the spot, one or two were even trying to tell him that they should round up all Dopplegangers and kill them all. Long past been shocked or horrified by anything I could only wonder how in hell they were going to round up a people who could look like anyone!

Millerna got one look at the blood on me and demanded that I see a healer for treatment.

"If you think I look bad, you should see the other guy," I quipped dryly. I knew that in a little while I was going to collapse to my knees and start shaking or crying and not be able to stop. Right now I knew that I was just sort of running on autopilot.

One man actually made a sensible suggestion.

"We need to get Duke Chid someplace where he'll be safe in case we didn't get them all and they decide to try again," one of the guards said above the din.

"How do we know you're not one of them trying to get our Duke alone so you can finish him?" another person called from the back.

I could see where this was going without having to look at the future. The accusations and counter accusations would start flying back and forth as the tide of paranoia rose to a crescendo. Nothing would get done.

"Hey..." I said quietly. No effect. Of course not.

"**HEY**!" I said, amplifying my voice and Presence with my Gift. The noise at last shut off.

"I can see the Dopplegangers true form," I said. "No matter what face they wear I can always see their true face now."

"It's true," Allen confirmed. "She pointed out the one attacking the duke without even using her pendant."

I switched to Othersight and spotted one that was milling around with the others in disguise, he was trying to sidle away.

"That woman in the feathered robe!" I cried pointing. "He's one!"

He tried to protest innocence but someone hit him with a tazer and in the shock of pain his true form popped out for an instant. I looked around again, all clear.

"In times like these it seems to me that Freid needs the Mirror of Truth more than ever," Chid said quietly. "We'd never have to wonder if a Doppleganger was present in disguise if we had the Mirror in residence."

"That's true," Dryden said. "It looks like fate has conspired once more to bring all of us with a connection to this artifact together to find it. First with the Mystic Valley and now with the Mirror."

"Coincidence," Allen said flatly.

"That damned beam of light," I added. It seemed to have a mind of its own, drawing people together and putting them in places for its own purposes.

"Well whatever it is, " Chid said decisively. "We're all the right people in the right place at the right time to bring the Mirror of Truth back to Freid."

"And the quest on board Drydens ship will remove the duke to a secure location so that the palace guard can run a full security check on the palace," Allen added.

It was decided. I was amazed at the alacrity with which the staff (after having been verified by me) readied the three ships Dryden was bringing for the voyage. We were all underway by later that evening.

I was sharing a room with my best friend Yukari, she'd claimed the top bunk when we were picking out quarters though at the time I'd wondered why she'd bothered; we both just knew she'd probably spend her nights with Amano. It was a mercy however, she'd left me to my own devices when I'd told her I was tired from all of that running and just wanted to get some sleep. What I was actually after was some time to myself so I could collapse in peace without having to bother or worry anyone else. It had happened a time or two after I'd had particularly bad Visions; some quiet time by myself to get a grip a stuff it all away would set me right again. So now I was alone and it was quiet.

I'd been running on autopilot for the past few hours, giving all the right responses and just doing what needed to be done to get underway, promising myself a nice time to collapse later. Not right then, but later. Now the time had come.

I needed a shower... now! I stripped myself of the blood-stiff clothes, wishing I could burn them. Walking over to the tiny-ships bathroom I turned on the water in the shower stall to steaming and let it all wash over me. I started shaking with reaction-fear and couldn't seem to stop. My mind kept playing the scene in that clearing like a tape set on loop. My nerves and skin and muscles seemed to remember every nuance of the way it had felt to crush one mans windpipe or slide a blade into another doppleganger's chest and they insisted on viscerally replaying it for me. I writhed about trying to get rid of that awful feeling. I washed myself twice but I could still feel the hot blood splattering on my skin! I seemed to fade out al little, vaguely aware that I was... crying.

"Hitomi?" I barely heard my room-mate call in over the buzzing in my ears. The next thing I knew Yukari was helping me out of the shower, which I now vaguely realized, was freezing cold. How long had I been standing there? I couldn't remember and I couldn't stop shaking or crying. Yukari wrapped me up in a towel and told me to wait there on the bed and left the room. A few minutes later Millerna appeared in the doorway, looking concerned. I was still crying and I couldn't seem to stop. When Yukari put a sympathetic arm around me the sobs just got worse. I started babbling about what had happened around by bouts of sobbing; they were both being so kind and I somehow felt as though if I didn't get this out I'd explode. Yukari was my best friend, so it was okay...right?

But I couldn't stop crying, I just couldn't stop. In desperation I pulled up my gift and reached out for that ephemeral moon-mist cord that connected my heart to Van's. I felt at first his surprise and then his concern but then he felt I needed him so it wasn't long before I was wrapped in warmth and reassurances. Normally it was only just our feelings that reached each other; vague impressions of happiness, or sadness, or assurances but somehow now that I was here on Gaea the ephemeral impressions had gone from being vague and distant to feeling so clear and immediate it was like he was standing there in the room with me. I half expected to actually feel his arms around me and was disappointed when all I felt was his heart. Still, the feelings were strong and seemed to wrap all around me, enveloping me in warmth and light. I felt the wounds on my heart and soul from the earlier disaster gradually ease and soothe away completely and still the connection held. Just feeling that warmth spreading out from my chest made me relax completely. It was okay now.

Pretty soon I started feeling actually tired, my eyes seemed to close on their own and Yukari and Millerna helped me actually slide into bed. I could hear their voices talking concernedly over me but I couldn't quite understand what they were saying. I just let myself fall down into sleep the last thing I was aware of before exhaustion claimed me was the barest whiff of the scent of the wind over green fields; the scent of Fanelia.


	4. Chapter 4

I woke up the next morning with my eyes feeling dry and itchy, I had a few strains and bruises from what had happened yesterday and they twinged as I sat up in bed. I hadn't had a very restful nights sleep either; in my dreams I'd been fighting doppleganger after doppleganger and they'd just kept coming. I killed them all and the bodies started piling up around me; blood spurting at me from all directions. Or I'd be running in my dreams, like a rabbit trying to get away from a predator. I woke up around dawn feeling exhausted and when I'd fallen back to sleep I hadn't had any dreams that I could remember.

Now awake, I waited for the tears and shaking to come on again but... nothing. I didn't feel empty or numb like I had yesterday where nothing had seemed to faze me through a cloud of numbness, but instead I felt clear-headed and steady; much more like my usual self. I shrugged a little and stretched up to work the kinks out of my back. My body felt achy and bed-sore from all the tossing and turning I'd done last night; and there were still those aches and bruises from the fights. Other than that I felt... normal. It was just another day. My stomach rumbled at me and I felt a little bemused that something so mundane could happen after all of that. I'd faced people who had wanted to kill me; and I'd killed them in order to live. And now it was another day. I was alive.

I dressed myself in comfortable blue-jeans and a teeshirt that said "I think, therefore I am single" on it and ran through a few stretches to get rid of that achy morning stiffness. My stomach rumbled again so I departed my sleeping quarters and went in seach of the cafeteria. My internal pendant didn't steer me wrong and soon my nose was treated to the exotic scents of Freidian cuizine.

"Morning Yukari!" I called as I grabbed a bowl of rice and a plate of something that looked safe enough to eat. Millerna, Amano Allen and Dryden were all there as well and they stared in wordless shock at me as I sat down and started eating. I hadn't eaten since yesterday afternoon so I was pretty hungry.

"Hitomi...?" Amano said hesitantly.

"What?" I asked, looking up at him from my bowl of rice. I was forced to eat it with a fork instead of proper chopsticks, but who was I to complain?

"Are you okay?" asked Yukari.

"Yeah," I said nodding my head a little. "I think I am. I feel... fine. Oddly enough."

"Are you sure?" Millerna asked.

"I think so," I replied. "I know I was wigging out last night but this morning I woke up and I felt normal."

"You might still be in shock," said Amano.

"I really don't think so," I said. "I know what happened. My mind doesn't deny that I... killed those men." I was having a little trouble saying the word but I managed to get by with a minimum of trouble.

"But it was them or me," I went on. "Worse; it was them or Chid and me. I didn't have much choice but to fight because there was no where else I could run to. My father once told me that Martial Arts trains the body to fight with the hope the knowledge will never be needed; well it was needed yesterday in order to save my life and Chid's. But yesterday was yesterday and today is today. I'll accept that, and enjoy the rice."

"Enjoy the rice?" Yukari said, looking at me strangely.

"Yes," I said. "It's good rice."

It did taste kinda good. It was ordinary enough rice, but there was a sweetness to it that I hadn't appreciated before. I think that this might have been the best bowl of rice I'd ever tasted. My friends were all looking at me rather strangely, all except for Allen who seemed to understand it for some reason.

"Are you sure you're not-" Millerna said again.

"It's common enough in warriors after they've been blooded," Allen said quietly. "The world seems more alive and every sense is heightened, sharpened. It just a natural reaction, a natural way of coming to terms with the fact that you've lived another day and celebrating that."

He handed me another bowl of rice.

"Enjoy your rice," he said, and rose with a bow to all present to go check on his sister.

Without comment I finished my first bowl and moved on to the second. With a final worried look in my direction my friends turned the topic to normal things and let the conversation drift. Millerna wanted to look in Drydens library for some obscure medical text. Dryden, as captain, would be at the helm keeping us on course. Yukari was all for spending the day on deck sunning herself and I decided that this sounded like a plan to me! Amano would be nearby ogling us but as long as he did it quietly it was not a problem.

So after brunch we two ladies went to our room to change into our sunbathing bikini's. I was wearing a sarong over it but Yukari was always more outgoing than me and just wore her skimpy thong proudly unaccompanied. I think she liked the attention, I had to admit, she did have a great figure (and her chest was larger than mine too) but I wasn't entirely uncute myself. I had great legs from all that running, nice and shapely; my hips were curvy too which gave me that whole hourglass thing going on. The two of us laid out our towels on the main deck and Yukari switched on the stereo. Now this was what a vacation should be! No running for your life, no fighting off attackers to protect people; just a girl, her skimpy ass bathing suit and lots and lots of sunshine!

The sun felt good, and I was looking pretty pale from the long winter. I could use some color. The two of us lounged at the side of an actual swimming pool installed in the top-most deck of the air-palace Dryden called a ship. I had to admit, the guy was ahead of his times, or maybe he just enjoyed swimming. Anyway, Yukari and I soaked up the sun in the lounge chairs while Amano manned the drink station mixing drinks and ogling our legs. We two girls were busily ensconced by ignoring him and flipping through the pages of one of her fashion mags and discussing the fashions in it; whether the models were in fact too pale and skinny to make the clothes look realistic on a person of normal proportions and whether or not it was a good idea to loose weight by consuming only yogurt for a month straight. It didn't sound healthy to me but Yukari swore that yogurt was the new nectar of ambrosia.

After an hour or so, the two of us basted ourselves again with SPF 15 and turned over to brown on the other side. I was quietly reading a book with my sunglasses on when a shadow loomed over my pages. I looked up to go chase Amano off from offering to rub more lotion on our legs (he'd offered three times, the little perv) but instead it was Allen. It was Allen looking shocked and mortified.

"What are you... Were are your clothes!" he demanded sounding like he was going to have a fit of apoplexy at any moment.

"We're sunbathing," Yukari said.

Uh-oh... she had that look in her eye. She was about to have some fun with poor Allen. I had to admit, I kinda did want to see what would happen so I didn't say anything.

"You're in the public wearing practically nothing! There's not even enough there to be considered an undergarment!" He gestured to both of us. I was dressed just a little more modestly than my best friend, who rather liked to tease people by putting it out there and then making out with her boyfriend. My sun-bathing suit did cover both of my cheeks and the top was a band with tying around the neck and a strap around the torso instead of two cups held together by a string (I didn't quite have the cleavage to support that). Yukari had a miniscule thong and the afore mentioned cup-and-string model.

"What?" Yukari said, winking subtly at me, I barely held in my grin. "You don't like it?"

"It's indecent," Allen said firmly.

"Well in that case I suppose I should remove the object of your objections entirely." Yukari said devilishly.

She was grinning. Allen looked caught like a deer in the headlights. I could see it written on his face: "she wouldn't seriously...?"

"All these strings," she said, snapping the side band at her left hip. "Too uncomfortable!" I kept a straight face on by the barest of margins. It looked like Allen wasn't certain whether he should avert his eyes or continue staring in fascination.

"And this strap here," she said tugging a little on the string that went around her torso. "It digs too much." I almost snickered; the little minx! Cruel and unusual treatment of Allen. Death by Mortification.

Teasingly Yukari fingered the front clasp to her suit top, hefting up her breasts until they nearly popped out of the top.

"Oh! And it's chafing me!" she cried dramatically. I couldn't hold it in any more. I burst out laughing. Yukari continued to pose as if in an agony of discomfort, each one worse than the last as far as exposure went. I was laughing so hard my stomach hurt while Allen just stood there looking myopic and horrified. The look on his face was priceless. Out came the camera.

Yukari snickered, turning to me.

"Listen to this guy."

"Allen," I tried explaining. "On our world it's considered somewhat normal for women to sun themselves in bathing costumes like these during the summer. It's fashionable to have some color. We don't walk around like this all of the time, only in certain times and certain places. The poolside being one of them. It's summer after all. Now do be a dear and move, you're blocking my sun."

He didn't look very mollified by that, but it wasn't his lookout so I turned back to my book.

"And since you're just standing there, go fetch me a drink," Yukari said waving him off like an attendant. "Tell him I want more ice in the daq."

"You are _bad_ girlfriend," I said grinning after Allen stormed off in a huff. "Just completely evil."

"It was kinda fun though wasn't it?" She said conspirationally.

"Absolutely," I said.

"Hey babe," said Amano, looking hopeful. "Do you need some more lotion yet?"

Yukari nodded eagerly and sidled over to her amore. After about half a minute, rubbing lotion was the last thing on their minds.

"Oh man," I said ducking my head. "Get a room you two."

"Can we use yours?" Amano asked bluntly. "Allen is probably sulking in mine."

I really didn't want to picture the two of them getting it on in the place where I sleep but...

"Don't use my bed," I stipulated. "And don't forget your condoms."

As their nominal chaperone it was my job to be responsible.

The hot sun soaking into my skin had made me drowsy and I was halfway between sleeping and waking when Dryden came to ask me about the next course heading. He didn't seem bothered by my costume, or if he was he didn't make a big production out of it. I pulled on my sarong, but then thought better and took out my mumu; sure it was mostly known as "the fat lady dress" but it gave me full coverage.

We had already passed over the canyon and were nearing the river. I remembered most of the details from my vision but it was a little fuzzy around the edges. I was going to need to dowse to get an accurate location.

"Does anyone have a necklace, or something on a string?" I called out to the men working on the bridge. They were men, so I got "no" for an answer; men did not wear necklaces. I couldn't go back into my room to fetch one of mine, perhaps Millerna...

"Here," Dryden said a little uncomfortably. "You can use this."

From inside his long big-sleeved robes he pulled a ring on a gold chain. I nodded solemnly as I recognized his wedding ring. He'd given it back to Millerna, but probably had had a copy made to keep with him or something. I could tell that it meant a great deal to him by the way his eyes never left it.

I walked over to the map spread across the table and centered my powers. I hadn't done much location dowsing since that time I'd used it to rescue Van and that had taken me hours. This time however, the dowsing pendant pulled after only a little while. Over the river, heading east past the red dunes out towards the sea, down the coast just past the Rang Caverns. We made a little dot to mark the location where the pendant stopped.

I asked to have a word with Dryden as I returned him his ring and delicately explained to him that Amano and Yukari would prefer to have the same room and was there anyone he could switch me out with? It looked like I was rooming with Celena and or Millerna. The princess had a suite on board the vessel and her Ladies Maid roomed with her, they'd probably be happy to make room for me if I asked.

I debated on what I wanted to do next. Since I was dressed for it anyway I might as well enjoy a little swim. The pool was still waiting for me when I got back to the upper deck so I dove right in and swam a few laps for a little while, thinking that maybe I'd missed something by not joining the swim team. I was taking a small break just floating on my back and looking up in the sky when all of a sudden I felt and odd current tickle along my side. Thinking that somehow either Amano or Yukari had snuck into the pool and were about to grab me and dunk me under, I abruptly swiveled upright and started treading water. I looked at the space in front of me in puzzlement at first, not able to comprehend what it was that I was seeing...

It was water. But... it wasn't... I looked again, blinking and rubbing my eyes. It was still there. Facing me directly nose to nose was a human-shaped woman made of water. Yes, water. She was clear and I could see right through her, like an ice statue just starting to melt. It was like a CG image I'd seen in a movie only it was real... or I think it was real. Maybe I'd fallen asleep and drowned or something. Yes that was it, that was probably it. I blinked again. It was still there.

Curious I reached out to touch the water being. I felt warm water for a moment and then she just... disappeared. The water splashed back down into the pool in rain droplets like it had never stood up in the air. I looked at the ripples in front of me.

Weird, I thought, immediately ready to dismiss it as an hallucination.

But then it happened again. The water suddenly rose up in an amorphorous blob and morphed back into the shape of a woman; her features were perfect in a rippley, watery kind of way, and I could see her smile at me. Seeing water move into a smile when you can see right through its head was really weird.

"Er.. ah... Hello," I said weakly.

The thing laughed at me with a strange sound, a little like an echoey watery bubbly laugh. I blinked again. Still there.

Maybe I'm losing my mind, I thought.

"Lovely day," I said. Why not? I was accustomed to seeing things no one else saw, what was one more hallucination?

Great, just when I though my life couldn't possibly get any weirder. 

"Well; dragons, mermaids, floating rocks, people that are half animal... why not water spirits?" I mused to myself.

The water spirit looked at me with a curious expression on its face; a hungry, pleading expression like when a dog sees you eating at the table and wants some of what you're having. I closed my eyes once more. Surely this time...

Still there.

The being of water looked at me one last time but I couldn't tell what it wanted. It disappeared and did not return.

Okay well, chalk that up as a ten on my weird shit-dometer. 

Okay... moving on now. I realized that I was all by myself right now for possibly the first time since this adventure had started. Immersing myself in the culture of Freid at the city of Godashim, keeping busy by sparring with Yukari, and readying for the party had kept me occupied for the last three days in a whirlwind of activity. This was not by accident but by design. I didn't want to be alone, I didn't want to have time by myself somewhere quiet because I knew myself too well. I was a chronic worrier. I knew if I found myself alone with nothing to do or distract me, I'd start thinking about what I really wanted, thinking would lead to brooding would lead to worrying would lead to trouble. I did not want trouble. However, everyone else was already doing other things and I didn't want to intrude.

I just have to keep from worrying, I told myself. There was one sure-fire cure I had recently discovered in my new pursuit. It was called meditation. It's specific purpose was to clear the mind of all thought (in my case of all the thousand tiny little nagging worries that buzz around me like flies) and train it inward. It could create what psychologists call a state of altered consciousness. It could also create a sore lower back and achy knees if you weren't careful. The altered consciousness I could vouch for (as well as the achy knees) it usually had the unfortunate side effect of awakening my powers with unusual clarity. Still, I had discovered that if I really worked at it, really concentrated, it would show me what I wanted to see instead of something that usually made no sense to me.

I sat down in the lotus position at the edge of the pool and stared out into the ripples. I just needed to calm myself, find my center. I clapped my hands once then lowered them to my knees, closing my eyes. I inhaled deep breaths down into my diaphragm, slow, measured. I felt my muscles assume a feel that was at once completely relaxed and yet ready to move at any moment. Be silent, be still. I concentrated on my breathing trying to empty my thoughts of everything. Just clear my mind and focus on nothing. Relax.

There was only one thing I really wanted to see right now, and only one thing I really wanted to know about... Van, of course. I could just try to take a quick look, just to see how he was doing.

Closing my eyes I emptied my mind; it was harder than it sounded... a lot harder. To be empty was to exist in a perfect state of concentration and relaxation, to in effect become potentiality. The mind was always going, going, going on my world, there were always so many distrctions. It often seemed like my modern life was made of nothing but distractions all of the time. Television, video games, movies, commercials, manga's, massive books in print, radios, CD's; the list just went on and on. Even when you ignored all of this stuff the mnd was not an easy thing to make completely quiet... there were always thoughts to distract you. I'd try to sit still and think of absolutely nothing, but my mind usually just would not shut up, or if I could manage to empty my thoughts enough I'd soon grow bored and my attention would wander. I'd start to worry about the scores on the latest test I took or how I was doing in my english class or I'd start thinking about what I was going to do on that weekend or what I'd eat for dinner or any other stray thought that just popped into my head.

Clearing the mind and reigning it into silence took effort and real focus of will. But only when there was stillness could I hear that small, quiet voice inside of me. So I steadily and methodically relaxed my muscles one by one, then concentrated on my breathing while maintaining a perfect state of relaxation. Then once my attention had been turned completely to this I endeavored to empty my mind of even its concentration on the form; to let go of my thoughts, let go of my intellect and concentrate. I felt my mind sink into that comforting lull; psychologists called it an altered state of conciousness.

In that stillness there was a feeling of peace and freedom unlike anything else; I felt in balance and at peace with myself. This time was a little different however... after a moment of suspended peace that usually came when I had at last achieved meditation there came something utterly different. A Vision. A Vision of my own calling no less.

I saw Van. I couldn't control that my heart picked up its pace a little and my stomach fluttered. I suddenly understood completely what Naria and Eryia had meant when they'd said that being near their beloved was the only thing they needed to feel happy. Just seeing Van filled me with a sense of well-being and utter rightness, like I had finally found the one place in all of the universe where I truly belonged. I eagerly drank in the sight of him, committing every detail every line to memory like parched earth soaked up the rain.

He was tall now, possibly even taller than Allen, and had lost that gangly half-finished look that all adolescent boys had.

He was walking down a long hallway with Merle walking beside him. He looked so grim, but resigned; Merle looked worried. Well, Merle usually looked worried; when she wasn't getting an attitude that was. I couldn't quite make out their voices just yet but from what I was seeing she was asking him about something in a concerned tone. Van replied back and I could just make out his voice drifting down to me.

"...know you don't like it Merle but by ancient law and tradition they have this right. I'll just have to face them."

"But Lord Van!" Merle tried again. "What if something happens to you?"

"Don't worry Merle," Van said reassuringly. "At least not before the fact. If I do get injured then you can worry all you like, until then try to have faith."

What's going on? I wondered. Folken spotted me. Even as a ghost he was still hanging around Fanelia to keep an eye on his little brother. I just hoped I didn't run into Varie; I was afraid that I would give her too much of a piece of my mind now that I was older.

:Hitomi: Folken asked, looking surprised. :Are you dead:

:Not exactly: I replied. :I'm Visioning... if that's even a verb.:

:I see: he replied.

:Can you tell me what's going on: I asked him. Merle looked worried and upset about something, and whenever she wore that look it usually meant Van was about to go and do something dangerous or stupid (or both). And I wasn't there to keep him out of real trouble this time. She was right to be worried.

:It's a King of Fanelia thing: Folken said cryptically.

:You can start explaining: I gritted. :I can be here all night if I have to.:

:Very well: Folken said resignedly. :Fanelia is a very old kingdom; it is said that only Freid is older.:

I was beginning to patch together a history of life on Gaea from the bits and pieces I'd gathered here and there. Perhaps I would go over it later with Dryden and get a more detailed accounting. Whether I liked it or not I seemed to be involved with Gaea and it might be helpful to know more about the place I was involved in.

:According to legend: he continued. :The first king, Fanel, united all of the Samurai Lords by defeating them one by one in sword combat. But simply defeating them was not enough for the proud Samurai Lords, they forced him to meet a final challenge; Fanel had to go out alone into the forest and using only a sword slay one of the mighty fire-breathing dragons that lived there and bring back its energist as proof of the deed, thus showing them all that he was strong enough to defend his people. The warrior thus slew the dragon and became the first king of Fanelia.:

Folken suddenly gave a small quiet laugh and looked nostalgic.

:You know: he said. :I used to read Van that story when we were younger. He always thought that it was mean of the first king to kill a dragon that had never harmed him.:

:I do know actually: I said. :I saw you read to him once in a vision. I only caught the end of the story however. I suppose this is why Van had to go out and kill a dragon as his Rite of Passage then.:

:All those who would be king of Fanelia must: Folken said a little sadly. :Anyway, the tradition of the Rite of Dragon Slaying to prove ones worth to be king is a time-honored and cherished tradition in Fanelia. There is another tradition however that stems from this same legend although it has been honored more in the breach than the observance. The thirteen Warlord Samurai that Fanel had to face in the legend were made into Lords upon his Ascension, they were given lands and titles and a position of honor in the first King's court; but there was a final caveat made upon the king by the proud warlords before they would bow to him; that at any time within their history they or their descendents might challenge the king to combat by sword if they felt that he was not a good king.:

:I suppose that explains why Van received a sword with the royal crest on it and not a crown like I'd expected: I said.

Personally I thought a crown was a more fitting representation of rule; a good ruler ruled with his head and not by force of arms or so I was brought up to believe. The whole "might makes right" mentality suggested by the sword kinda bothered me. I know Van would never abuse it, he is too good inside, but that doesn't say anything about his descendants or his ancestry. There's a bad apple in every tree; just look at some of the Emperors from ancient Rome.

:Yes, and it shall soon see the use it was forged for unfortunately: Folken said. :The warlords met in convocation this last spring as Van was just finishing off the rebuilding and tallying the debts he owed for resources borrowed. He hated every bit he had to borrow too, thinks it's a sign of weakness.:

:I can imagine: I said wryly. Van was very much the picture of Solitary Warrior. He still wasn't much on accepting help when it was offered, even if he needed it. I'd have to talk with him about that.

:They decided: Folken said. :That such a young boy who had allowed Fanelia to be overrun by an invading army just after he'd Ascended while he'd escaped in Escaflowne was cowardly and thus unfit to rule.:

:But Van didn't run away: I protested. :He went back to fight despite the fact that I told him he was out of his mind to think he could take on that many people with only one suit and no real idea how to pilot it. The only reason we got away at all was that damned pillar of light:

:I know that and you know that: Folken said. :But the Lords have taken their own view of events. They also noted that he was not quick to return to his homeland. They think he was a coward.:

:Like bloody hell: I swore, incensed on Van's behalf. :He tried to go back at first. He even took me with him to get Escaflowne away from Allen so he could return to Fanelia, but Zaibach attacked and Van had to fight again. Van's no coward, don't these men know he's a war hero! Every nation from Freid to Ceasario is indebted to him for his bravery on the battlefield.:

:The Samurai Lords spend all of their time sequestered away in their own Halls in the mountains, attending to their own affairs: Folken said calmly. :They only see what directly affects them. The absence of their King and their trade city affected them, they think that Van is weak and has lost the right to rule. They decided in the spring that they would come down from their lands with their best warriors to challenge Van to Trial by Combat. As the first king was tested, so too shall they test Van.:

:He's going to have to meet thirteen warriors in sword combat: I said, aghast at the idea. :What if he loses:

:Then the one who defeats him will become the new king: Folken said. :And Van will be outcast.:

:That's not fair: I protested hotly. :They don't even know the whole story behind everything that happened, how can they pass judgment on him like that! Well it doesn't matter; Van's more than good enough to defeat all of them and send them scampering home with their tails between their legs.:

:The Warlords may be an insular lot: Folken cautioned. :But they spend much of their time honing their skill. Van is an excellent swordsman... but still a young one.:

:My father always said that experience and treachery trumps youth and enthusiasm every time. Well, minus the treachery part in this case. Samurai Warriors consider that sort of thing beneath them... they do don't they: I asked suddenly, not reassured by Folken's silence.

:Yes Lady Hitomi: a deep booming voice said from behind me. I turned (figuratively of course since none of us were actually there in the physical sense). :A samurai of Fanelia never lies.:

:Balgus: I said. I hadn't known him for very long unfortunately, but I'd liked the old man. He'd been very kind to me when I'd first come to Gaea and was feeling a little afraid and uncertain. The fact that he'd been mentor to both Allen and Van and they'd turned out fine also spoke well for his character.

:A samurai of Fanelia may never lie: Folken said quietly. :But I wouldn't put it past one of those lords to tip the odds in their favor.:

:Do you think Van is in danger: I asked anxiously. I was already in the middle of something in another part of the globe so unless I summoned a pillar of light I wouldn't be able to help Van out any time soon. Still, I couldn't imagine a guy my own age about to face off with thirteen hardened warriors, some of them old enough to be his father, not being in some form of danger; the only question was, was it the kind of danger he could live through.

:And he wasn't exactly what you would call an enthusiastic pupil: I reminded Balgus, remembering Van's reluctance to enter into mortal sword combat.

:His skills have improved greatly since I left the world: Balgus defended. :He's Allen's equal certainly, and Allen is the best in all of Asturia... of course he was my pupil as well.:

So Balgus had pride too, I noted.

:What are his chances do you think: I asked.

:That will depend on him: Balgus said cryptically. He was frowning a little, more of a worried frown than a displeased one.

:You think he's got something on his mind: I said, making it more of a statement than a question.

:He does: Varie said fading into existence beside us. Great, the queen had joined in to dole out more pearls of wisdom. Grrrrr.

:Hitomi: she said turning to me. :You should not have contacted him.:

Wonderful, so now this was my fault too? Hows about you blame me for there being no air in space while you're at it Lady? I checked my temper and tried not to glare at her.

:I needed help: I said. :Excuse me for being mortal and imperfect.:

:Uh-oh: siad Folken, obviously recognizing the look on my face.

:But now Van is distracted in worrying about you: she returned with perfect equanimity. I wanted to slap that bland look off her face. Elder or not.

:So I'll contact him tonight and tell him everything's okay: I growled.

:You must be more careful in making wishes from--:

:Don't help: I said shortly. :I think you've helped me more than enough already. Telling a fifteen year old girl in _that_ kind of a situation that she's responsible for everything bad happening is not only unreasonable but unkind as well. So how about this? Unless you've walked a mile in my shoes, keep your opinions to yourself.:

Varie looked shocked and affronted. Good.

:You are at the nexus of great change; Gaea needs you: Varie said. :And you, obviously, need guidance.:

:If I want your help I'll ask for it: I said. :But frankly I don't think you're qualified.:

:Now now you two: Folken tried to intervene before it could get ugly. The result was only to be predicted. We both turned on _him_.

:Stay out of it Folken: we both snapped at the same time. He raised his hands and retreated. Smart man. That's really the only thing a guy could do in the middle of an incipient cat-fight; get out of the way so they don't decide to take him out before starting in on each other.

:You dare speak to me of qualifications: Varie said disbelievingly. This could get ugly, but hey... we were both "alpha bitches" so there was only two ways things could go; we respect each other and get along or we hate each other and duke it out.

:You, who have the ability to see the heart, the past and the future, yet can't seem to pick up on a simple and obvious thing such as the fact that my son was in love with you? You dare accuse me of being insensitive:

:If the shoe fits, wear it as we say on my world: I replied back. :And leave Van out of this.:

:You are too young to appreciate the delicate position that your powers have placed you in: Varie replied.

:Even if I am: I said. :It's not your place to tell me so, especially if you can't do so with any tact. Lady Varie, don't think I don't respect you as my elder or that I don't appreciate the suffering you have endured, but you can't advise me on what I should or should not do based on the way you see things. You don't even know me and I'm under enough pressure as it is. My world is peaceful, and in it I'm still considered a child; expecting me to be prepared to handle situations with equilibrium that would rattle an adult is unfair and unreasonable.:

:Prepared or not, reasonable or not, this world needs you and your gifts: Varie said without pity. :You have to maintain poise and control in the face of the unexpected.:

"Poise and control: I exploded. :Poise and control? How the hell am I supposed to be poised and controlled when all this weird shit is happening to me:

:Tone, young lady: she admonished.

It was on the tip of my tongue to shout that I'd show her some tone but I reigned myself in barely in time. I had a temper and this woman got on my nerves but that was no excuse to yell her out about it; she was after all my elder. I needed to call in my lifeline.

"Gramma!" I yelled. I could always count on her for wisdom, strength, and balance. My grandmother materialized at my side.

:Hitomi... deep breaths: she advised. I obeyed feeling a little better.

:What seems to be the trouble: she asked after a moment.

here we are, brand new chapter. I'd like to thank everyone who reviewed my previous one, Silver Blossom, Avelyn Lauren and my two new ones Majka and Miss Rule, hope to see everyone leave a note on this one.

Van gets a big mention here and this will be important later on in the story, but the main thrust of the story comes in the next chapter. Sorry everyone, no Van in that one, but all things happen in their own due time. I promise that when they finally do meet; it will be well worth the wait. Until next time!

Nightheart


	5. Chapter 5

:This woman here seems to think I should be responsible for everything that happens in the world simply because I seem to have powers that Gaea reacts to better than the average Joe Gaean: I said with some heat. The words she'd said to me at our last encounter still stung.

:Hitomi needs to understand that whether she intends it or not, her heart affects matters on this world: Varie argued. :And that if she is to play the role she needs to play shortly she must control her emotions and her powers more effectively than she has been doing.:

:I see: Grandmother said serenely. :Both of you make excellent and valid points. Let's have tea.:

:Tea: I asked. :Now:

:Naturally: Grandmother stated. So there we were; two ghosts and an astral traveler sitting at a spectral kotatsu sipping on jasmine tea. I had to admit, the familiarity and formality of the ritual did help me feel calmer and less like ripping her head off at any minute.

:Now Hitomi: Grandmother started. :You're seventeen now, in another four months you'll be a legal adult. You'll leave your mother and fathers house, hopefully attend one of those colleges you've been looking at, and begin making your way in the world yes:

"Yes: I said. :I'm looking at attending Kagana Prefecture University, it's the most prestigious of all of the offers I've had.:

:A good choice: Grandmother said approvingly. :And your mother and father approve:

:Yes, they're pleased: I replied.

:Good. Now: she said turning to Varie. :You have stated previously that Gaea reacts strongly to the power of Hitomi's wishes have you not?"

:Correct: Varie replied. :Whether or not she has a pendant, her powers enable her to see the unseen. That Sight will be absolutely vital to the role she is to fulfil.:

:What role: I demanded. :There's no role here. There's me going home and attending college.:

:Hitomi dear, hear her out: Grandmother admonished me.

:Yes ma'am: I replied.

:As I was saying: Varie said glancing sharply at me out of the corner of her eye. I barely restrained myself from sticking my tongue out at her. She continued.

:Hitomi has a powerful gift, one more powerful than even she realizes at this point, and I do not think it was an accident that she was born into the world at this time. Perhaps at fifteen she was a trifle young to be so burdened, but surely at seventeen she can fulfill her destiny.:

:And what do you say to this Hitomi: Grandmother asked me, her voice neutral.

:_No_: I replied with all the attitude I could muster. :The only destiny I have is the one I choose; and as soon as I can get an energist crystal and a pendant I'm going home where I belong.:

:Child, how can you be so willfully blind: Varie demanded. :Your feet are already on the path.:

:I'm not on any path: I denied. :And I have no intention of being some Great Cosmic Power's plaything. I may have been born with these weird powers but that doesn't mean anything. I can just ignore them if I want to.:

Grandmother sat back on her heels and took a long sip of her tea watching me reflexively. She looked a little disappointed. I lowered my gaze and sipped at my tea, trying not to feel resentful about it.

:She needs to understand: Varie said into the silence. :The world she comes from is self-centered and materialistic but Hitomi's heart is bigger than that. She was formed to fulfill this destiny. She was given a gift at birth and she can no more deny her heart and her destiny than she can deny the very person she is.:

:Hitomi, what do you say to that: Grandmother asked me.

:There is no plan: I replied, exasperated. :No direction. There's not predestined path that was written out for me to follow from before I was born. Destiny is what you make it, it's what you choose.:

:This is true: Varie acknowledged. :You have to make a choice to follow the path in order for things to work out.:

:Things just don't work out: I said flatly. :You have to work at them. Roll with the changes, make decisions, all that jazz.:

:A compromise then: my grandmother said. :Perhaps you are both right. Hitomi, darling; sometimes... sometimes we end up in places or in situations that force us to do those very things you just spoke of. Sometimes we are put into places that make us see things in another way; that force us to grow and mature, that force us to make the best decisions we can make. It might not be this "destiny" that many people believe in, it might not be all preordained but sometimes... just sometimes mind you, you're the right person, in the right place, at the right time to do the right thing.:

I mulled that one over for a minute or two. It made sense to me and it was just the right blending of destiny and free will.

:By that same token Grandmother I think Varie still owes m an apology for what she said: I replied. :Just because she's dead doesn't mean she gets the monopoly on truth. I'm not responsible for things that happen that are completely out of my control no matter what kind of weird powers I have. Having her tell me that I was when I was so scared and vulnerable really hurt me.:

Oh, great, now I was tearing up. I sipped on my tea so she couldn't see my vulnerability.

:Varie: grandmother looked questioningly at the former queen of Fanelia. Varie pondered for a moment and at last said

:It seems that my decree was a little harsh. I did not mean to cause you so much anguish child; I only wanted to make you more aware of Gaea's sensitivity toward you.:

I nodded, swallowing down the lump in my throat.

:Well then: said my Grandmother with cheerful serenity. :Now that that bone of contention is out of the way lets explore this "destiny" that you seem to think Gaea has in store for Hitomi now.:

:In order to do that I must first explain a bit about the nature of Gaea itself that Hitomi is likely not aware of, having not been born nor raised here on this world.:

"Shoot, I'm up for a bit of history," I said regaining my composure.

:According to my kin, the Draconians: Varie said. :The world made of Will is itself a crystalization of that Will. It is guided and guarded by the crystalization of that Will. In short... energist.:

My eyebrows rose but I didn't interrupt.

:Energy from The Source in the planet core flows throughout everything on this world. It seeps from The Source deep within the ground and permeates the soil, which saturates the water, which then dissolves into the air. It flows throughout all of Gaea in one form or another.:

"Okay..." I said.

:However," Varie continued. :The energy that flows through Gaea does not exist in a mindless haze like mist hanging about, but rather collects in pathways much like water does. These pathways of energy flow in particular patterns about the world, and have since the planet was first formed. Not only do these pathways, that the Draconians call Meridians, maintain balanced energy throughout Gaea so that energy does not pool or collect in ways that would be dangerous they also maintain the world acting through the intermediary of Elementals. Meridians feed and nurture the Elementals as well as providing a medium for them to travel through. The Draconians use the Great Holy Seals in their Enclaves to commune with The Source, the Meridians, and to command the simple Elemental spirits to exist in ease and harmony with the land and the people. In effect, Draconians command the Elementals to maintain the balance of nature.:

"Elementals?" I questioned. "Nature spirits like Undine? The Draconians command them?"

:Yes. Gaea's great Meridians were erased my Dornkirks Zone of Absolute Fortune machine: Varie said. :Without the pathways, they cannot commune with nature, and they cannot guide and correct the Elementals as has been their duty from the beginning of this world. Without these pathways the Elementals have nothing with which to give them direction and they are in chaos right now. The energist that forms the core of this world and guides everything on it is thankfully undamaged by Dornkirks machine, though how long that will continue to be the case with the way matters are going is anyone's guess.:

:Dornkirks machine: I questioned. :You mean the one he used to create the Zone of Absolute Fortune:

Suddenly the vision I had had earlier, when I had first arrived on Gaea, came back to me. It had shown the world netted in ribbons of pinkish light, not entirely unlike the light at the heart of my pendant when it lit up, that had turned into a green mist and slowly faded away.

"You mean that the Zone of Absolute Fortune got rid of those Merillian thingies?" I questioned.

:The activation of Dornkirks Zone of Absolute Fortune dissolved the power from their proper channels and turned it into... well, into a soup if you will. Instead of flowing along in the patterns that are necessary to enable this world to function as it needs to, the energy is in a useless form. It is these pathways that regulate the weather, soothe the earth, and command the tides and other such things. Gaea needs those pathways or it will cease to exist. Violent storms, eruptions, earthquakes, tsunamis and other disasters will shatter this land and kill the people that live on it. In short, Gaea will be destroyed; it will come apart at the seams and this beautiful world will perish."

"That's terrible," I said. I was reminded of the short vision I had received in Freid just before the one about the Mirror of Truth. I had seen something that seemed a little like what she was explaining to me now. The green Zone of Absolute Fortune making the pink ribbons that flowed around the planet dissolve into mist.

"How do you expect to get those pathways to resolve again?" I asked. "Dornkirk's machine is probably now a worthless ruin and the only ones who knew how to use it anyway are all deceased."

:The Atlantians who built Gaea may be gone to dust now but they had a built in fail-safe just in case Freid should someday fail in it's duties to protect the Power Spot. There are seven Seals in this world, each at the heart of a Draconian Enclave where we commune with the world. The power will automatically collect within these seals. If the power of the Gaea Device should remain locked within these seals instead of flowing through Gaea's ecosystem as it is meant to the world will slowly dry up.:

"So either the world slinters apart and ends in fire, or the world slowly fades and dies by inches," I said. "Those are not good options. So tell me about these seals. They act as a fail-safe catch-all, rather like a back-up disk on a computer?"

:I don't understand," Varie said.

"Try to think of it like a book that is constantly changing as new words are added or taken out," I said. "A back-up disk is like a second copy that has all of the information of the first in case something should happen to the first."

:No..." Varie said, her brow pursing in an effort to explain things in a way I might understand. She and I were coming at this from two very different directions it seemed. :No, it doesn't actually contain all of the information that the Device has. The Seven Seals are nothing more than places that automatically draw the Power to them when they are activated. Due to Dornkirks wretched experiments with Fate there was a greater complication than all of the meridians fading to nothing.:

:Complication: I questioned. :What kind of complication:

"When my people attempted to use the Great Seals to purify all of that power in order to re-establish the Meridians in their proper order the Seals... burst apart.

:They burst apart: I said, in puzzlement. :As in, they exploded:

:That is another way of putting it, yes: Varie replied. :The negative energy unleashed by Dornkirks Machine upon the world, the energy that was tainted not by pure-hearted wishes but by greed and avarice, warped the Great Crystal Seals and they fragmented. The Great Seals are the massive crystallization of all that is left of the great wishing pendants that were made by our ancestors, the pendants they used to commune with their great machine and turn will into reality. These pendant fragments, with the evil taint of Dornkirks machine still within them, were scattered across the face of Gaea when the Seals exploded.:

"Then I don't see a problem," I said cheerfully. "The energy within those shards of energist should dissolve into the ecosystem naturally.:

:Incorrect: Varei said a little sharply. :These pieces of the Seal-energists, or Source Energist as we have come to call them, attracted the Elementals, power attracts power after all. The Elementals, needing the concentrated forms of energy that exist within the Meridians had been growing weak from the useless mist they had been trying to subsist on for weeks and in desperation for their own survival merged with the corrupted fragments of Source-energist.:

"Let me guess," I said knowingly. "The little critters got a taste of huge power and told the rest of your Draconian friends where to stick it?"

:In so many words... yes. My people managed to recall _most_ of the pieces back into the Seven Seals, but as I mentioned the Seals themselves are weakened from trying to absorb and purify so much tainted energy. There are many Elementals that merged with the tainted fragments of Seal that escaped being recalled. The rest of the Elementals have been safely sealed away inside the Seven Seals where they need no longer fear fading away from lack of the energy that sustains them until such a time as the Great Seals can be healed, then purified completely, and the Meridians can be restored. Most of the Elementals that have escaped being recalled to their Seals that have escaped have created physical forms for themselves. My kin have come to call them Source Elementals.:

:I still don't see what any of this has to do with me: I replied.

:You have the Sight, Hitomi: Varie said with admirable patience.

:Yeah, so: I said. :So I have the Sight, what of it:

"So you are the only one who can see the Source Crystals, which is what we have come to call the scattered shards of Source Energist to differentiate them from the actual Seals: she said exasperatedly.

:Oh! Well you didn't mention that part, how am I supposed to know? Besides, you said that those Source Elementals created bodies for themselves, I assumed that you meant everyone else would at least know what a hideous monster was right away and probably how to deal with one.:

:It is not finding one but slaying one that is the challenge. The fragments of the Seals or Source-energist are a hundred times stronger than an energist that comes from an adult dragon; the Source Eementals draw on this massive amount of power to fuel their own strength and thus make themselves nearly invincible to normal weapons.:

:That sounds bad: I said, still wondering what all of this had to do with me. She was getting to that.

:You must track down the Source Elementals: Varie said. "And destroy their physical bodies, thus returning them to their original astral forms and then you must use your powers to purify the Source Crystals, otherwise another Elemental will only come along and merge with the thing and thus begin the process all over again. Once you have all the missing fragments of the Seven Seals then the Seals can be healed and the Meridians restored.:

:What! Why me: I yelped in surprise. :I don't have anything to do with this, I'm not the one who screwed up:

:But your undeveloped powers will, with training, enable you to command the Elementals once you conquer them thus giving you the only weapon capable of defeating the extrodinary strength and power of a Source Elemental: Varie said.

:But-: I protested.

"And if these Source Elementals are allowed to gather enough power and strength they will become a threat that no-one, not even the Dragon Clans, can deal with. You must defeat them while they are still weak.:

"But... I don't wanna fight monsters," I said in a small voice. That did not sound like much fun to me at all, in fact it sounded like it was right up there with being dragged off to fight in someone else's war for Not Fun.

:Nevertheless, you're the only one who can do this task: Varie said inexorably. Well, who asked for her opinion anyway?

:The only one: I asked. :Isn't there anyone else who has the Sight like me:

:Now with such ease and clarity, and not that already knows about Gaea or has any connection with the people here. You are our only real hope.:

:Bugger: I muttered. :I'm stuck for it.:

It looked like my college career was just going to have to wait for a while. Bummer, and I'd been looking forward to the parties too!

I blinked and I was hovering next to my body. Everyone was gathered nearby looking over at me in concern, I must have been out of it for a while. That was odd, my body was surrounded by a strange dome of pink light. I shrugged and slipped back inside. The odd floating feeling of blah-nothingness that was the only sensation outside of my body faded and I suddenly felt cold! No, I was freezing! And I...was...tired...

I slumped forward as the pink dome around me disappeared and that was all I knew.

I woke slowly, feeling heavy and thick, like when you try to wake up on a cold, rainy afternoon. I had trouble keeping my eyes open and didn't really feel like mustering the strength to try so I turned positions in my soft, warm, comfy bed and slipped back into sleep. I don't recall if I had dreams or not. I woke again, later, still feeling sleepy and debated with myself whether I wanted to sty in bed or find something to eat. I was really hungry... really really hungry. And thirsty too. Maybe I could wait a while...

I tried to roll over and go back to sleep but my stomach wouldn't leave me alone; it had that empty pit feeling, like it was trying to wrap around my backbone so I sighed and gave in. A quick meal, and then more sleep.

I levered myself up onto my elbows and a girl seated in a chair next to my bed, it looked like she was sewing on something, looked over at me. I recognized her now, Allen's sister Celena.

"Oh!" she said in surprise. "You're awake!"

"Hungry," I grunted, trying to find the strength to finish getting out of bed.

"Wait right here, I'll go get you something to eat," Celena said.

"Lots of it," I qualified. "And drink too." I was feeling too hungry and thirsty and tired to be polite. Mental note, next time I want to go astral traveling, don't stay out of my body for so long talking to dead people. Okay, that whole sentence from start to last just sounded wat weird. WHat normal person thinks these things?

As promised Celena returned a few minutes later with a tray piled high with food and a few guests. Yukari, Millerna and Amano crowded in behind my food-bearer.

I started in on the digs while my friends babbled questions at me uninteligably for a few minutes. For once I wasn't going to care whether or not I looked like a pig. I was stuffing it down me almost faster than I could chew it; the ramen noodles I didn't even bother to chew I just slurped and swallowed.

"Hitomi, what happened to you?" Millerna demanded at last getting the other two to quiet long enough to get a question in.

"Eating," I grunted, polishing off the bowl of ramen and downing the tea in big thirsty gulps. They waited for a few minutes more while I ate. At last my appetite waned a bit and I began to talk around my food.

"I went to visit Van to see how he was doing. It was just going to be a short peek. But then I got sidetracked by Folken, then paused to talk to Balgus and then picked a fight with Queen Varie that my Grandmother had to mediate."

Millerna just stared.

"Folken?" she asked. "As in Van's dead older brother Folken?"

"That's the one," I agreed, chowing down on a bowl of rice.

"ANd you talked with dead Balgus and fought with dead queen Varie of Fanelia and..."

"ANd my grandmother is dead too," I supplied. "It's not as weird as you might think. No rotting body parts or anything, just ghosts. When I'm in astral form they look as alive as you do, except for the glow anyway. Good curry they have here on board this ship, I'll have to get the recipe. Thanks for the food."

"You see dead people?" Yukari asked.

"Not like in the sixth sense, I guess I have to know them in order to see them."

"You gave us all a scare," Yukari said. "None of us could get near you past that dome protecting you and you were just sitting there not moving and none of us could tell if you were breathing or not. You've been asleep for an entire day."

"Apparently using my powers like that takes it out of me," I said. "I'll have to be more careful."

Belly full, I set aside the plates and slid back under my covers and was asleep by the end of a yawn.

The next time I awoke it was fully dark in the room. I hadn't been awakened by my stomach this time and I still felt groggy but something awoke me. In the dark and stillness I could hear the faint sound of whimpering; someone sounded like they were having a nightmare. I switched on my Othersight and the shadows seemed to fade into a greyish blah and there across the room, lit up like a pine tree on the Krisumasu, was... well it looked like Celena but her aura was all over the place. First it was the calm sedate light greens and blues and pale purples I'd come to associate with her then it changed to a deep angry, sullen blood-red. A mottled crimson of blood-lust and black rage. The colors fought with one another for supremacy. Strange.

I got up out of bed and went to take a closer look. In my Othersight I saw something that shocked and horrified me. It was Dilandau! He was a pale astral form superimposed over Celena like some kind of strange artist compilation. He was thrashing about madly, that freaky psycho killing look in his eye. Poor Celena was whimpering, trying to fight.

Reacting without knowing precisely how I was doing what I was doing, I drew a breath deep into my dan'tien and at the same gathered my power. It curled up and out then circled into a flickering ball of lancing hot energy between my hands. I pushed again, expelling my breath and the ball steadied into a sphere with an inexplicable boundary of pinkish energy with a hotly pulsating star of power in the middle.

I shot the ball at Celena's sleeping form pushing it onto the phantom Dilandau with ephemeral hands. I breathed in again, pulling my hands apart and, just as if I were sucking up water with a vaccuum, Dilandau began to bleed into the pink ball. He fought me every step of the way but in the end I was victorious. Once he was trapped inside, the ball faded, and Celena's aura returned to its usual sedate colors.

I shook her gently awake.

"Celena," I hissed. "Hey, wake up."

She gasped inward, blinked, and looked up at me with wide, frightened eyes.

"Oh!" she said in surprise. "I'm sorry, I hope I didn't wake you. Just a little nightmare. Nothing to worry about."

He voice was quavering and I already knew better. This wasn't just a little nightmare, and it probably wasn't just only this night, but every night.

"How long has he been haunting you?" I asked, sitting down on her bed beside her. "Dilandau, I mean."

"How did you-?" she asked, looking both amazed and frightened.

"I Saw him," I replied steadily. "I have him under wraps for now. I'm not sure how, but it worked. I don't know how long that will last for however. I thought he was gone for good."

"So did I," Celena said. "SO did everyone. It wasn't long after I settled into my home with Brother that I started getting nightmares however; it didn't happen often at first but then they started getting more and more frequent. They've been happeneing every night for a while now. I didn't want to tell Brother, he'd only just worry. And if I told him about the dreams he might try to fix it; but the only ones who can fix it are the Sorcerers from Zaibach and I NEVER want to see them again. They frighten me, the same way they frighten him. I don't know what to do Hitomi. I'm starting to hear him now, not just in my sleep... but during the day time too! That's why I need to see it. I have to know."

"Need to see what? Know what?" I asked, puzzled by the non sequiter.

"The Mirror," she said. "The Mirror of Truth. The legends say that the mirror can show you you true Self and I have to know once and for all... am I me? Am I the one who belongs under the sun? Or is it Dilandau?"

"I can tell you that one," I said confidently but with utter seriousness. "It's you. You are Celena Encia Schezar and you belong in this body in this world. The only reason that Dilandau exists is because the Sorcerers created him. They needed a perfect killing machine, a weapon for war. To do that they had to take wars opposite; a true pacifist, and man's opposite; a woman, in order to polarize its fate thus achieving redirection. You're the real thing Celena... in the end, Dilandau is just a phantom."

"Then why won't he go?" Celena asked pleadingly.

"He's a _stubborn_ phantom," I replied. "But that's alright. We'll figure something out, but I think that vacuum bubble has bought you enough time and peace until we can figure out what to do."

"He won't come back tonight?" Celena said, with pathetic hope filled relief. poor thing.

"I don't think so, if he tries it I'll blast him with my power so hard he'll get knocked right out of your body. Get some sleep girl, we'll figure it out in the morning."

Well there was another thing on my plate, but I couldn't turn my back on the poor girl in trouble. I'd just take it one day at a time... and summon up Folken, maybe he could give us a clue or two about finishing scitzo boy off once and for all.

Tired, I returned to my bed and fell asleep again.

The next day I awoke late in the afternoon, wakened only by a knock on the door to the little chamber I was sharing with Celena (who was apparently waiting on Princess Millerna). It was little Duke Chid and he'd brought a little friend with him. Dryden had hired a man who's only family, a little girl Chid's own age, traveled with him.

"Hitomi, this is Kessa," Chid introduced us after he'd bowed his entry.

"Hello Kessa," I said.

"Hullo," she said shyly. "I've heard lots of stories about you."

"If they're good they're all true, if they're bad everyone's lying," I joked.

"I wanted to thank you again for saving my life," Chid said seriously. "I owe you a great debt of gratitude."

"You don't owe me anything," I said ruffling his hair like my own little brothers. He was such a cute little tyke. "We're friends right? I'd naturally help out a friend in trouble."

"But it's rare for even a friend to lay down their lives and fight off their enemies by hand," Kessa said, hero worship in her eyes. It looked like I had a fan. "I want to be brave and learn to fight just like you do!"

"It's not all glory and victory when you win," I said seriously. "My father would be the first to tell you that being any kind of real warrior is more about learning how not to fight. I'm not saying that you can't learn to defend yourself and others, just that you should make sure you've exhausted all of your other options first. Those men had chased me as far as I could run and had every intention of killing us both so I had no choice but to stand my ground and fight; but if I thought I might have stood a chance of reaching them I would have tried to negotiate with them for our safety."

"Isn't negotiating kinda... weak?" Chid asked, looking like most little boys did when faced with the notion of talking about their problems. I chuckled a little.

"I mean, my father was a great warrior," Chid continued. "In order to be just like him when I grow up, I'll have to be a great warrior too. My councilors all tell me that negotiation doesn't make great warriors."

"Not having known your father for very long I can't say for certain," I said. "But the impression I always got of him was one of great strength held in check by great wisdom. And negotiation may not hone the skill of a warrior, but it does hone to a fine edge the skills that make a great leader."

I got up from bed and called over the intercom for a pot of tea and a late brunch. I showed both of my guests to a nearby low table and we all seated ourselves at it. With Plaktu being the one exception, Chid wasn't getting the guidance and counsel he needed form his so-called Councilors. I wouldn't flatter myself with pretensions of any great wisdom seeing as I was still figuring out my way in the world as well; but there was one thing I did know... Tarot, and it was all about journeys.

"I know you probably get told this all of the time Chid," I began, straightening my shoulders to get comfortable. "But you're young yet, very young."

Chid sighed, probably anticipating another lecture on how he couldn't possibly understand the adult world. I smiled a little and went on, placing a tarot card face up on the table before us.

"This card is called the Fool," I said.

"The Fool?" he said, derisively, looking askance at the bright chipper young man about to step off from a cliff. "You mean he's an idiot?"

"He's called that because he's not watching where he's going and is about to step off a cliff despite the dog yapping at his heels in warning," I replied. "But what this card really means being full of potential; it's innocence and optimism and the special kind of wonder you only get as a child and everything is new for you. Sometimes a novel point of view can offer a surprising resolution to a problem so you should keep an open mind and not dismiss things out of hand."

"But everyone says I'm too young and can't do anything," Chid said dejectedly. "Even _you_ had to save me, and you're a _girl_!"

I laughed.

"Being young isn't necessarily a bad thing," I said. "True, people tend to condescend toward you because they think you don't know as much as they do because you haven't seen as much of the world, but it has it's advantages too. You might not have lived long enough in this world to grasp the full political ramifications of every decision you make but that also means that the decisions you make and really believe in are free from fetters."

"Huh?" he asked, looking confused.

"What I mean is that sometimes adults become... set in their ways. They get comfortable. This often makes them become unwilling to change and they become rigid and unbending, like a dried out old stick."

"That sounds like my entire council," Chid said morosely.

"And so the advice they give might not be the best decision to make because they themselves don't want to change. But you Chid," I said. "You can look at things with new eyes. You can see the world and all of its possibilities."

"I can," he said, sounding pleased there was at least something he could do because of his age.

"The world is always changing, looking at things from a new perspective helps us roll with the changes instead of becoming overly rigid."

"My father says that dried out old sticks break under pressure," Kessa said, speaking for the first time in conversation.

"They do indeed," I replied. The tea arrived and I went up and answered the door. When I got back Chid had a question for me.

"Hitomi," he said, looking at me with a little boy's dignified seriousness. "Will you marry me?"

"Awww, sweetie," I said, chuckling and ruffling his hair. Wasn't he just the sweetest little kid?

"You're smarter than anyone on my council," he said, looking hopefully at me. "You always know the right thing to say and people listen to you."

"I'm not so sure about that," I said modestly.

"They do," he insisted. "And if you marry me you get to be _duchess_! And we can play together everyday and the council will get off my back a little."

He sounded so pleased with himself, as if he'd found the solution to every problem in the existence of mankind. He had to be the cutest, most adorable little boy...

"Chid, sweetie," I said. "Much as I like you, I can't marry you hon."

"Why not?" he said looking as sad and disappointed as a puppy that had been told to go away. I decided against telling him that he was too young and said instead

"Because I already love someone else."

"Oh," he said sounding utterly dejected.

"I can't marry you Chid, but I can promise to always be your friend," I said. "As long as I'm here I'll help you if I'm able to."

"You mean it?" he asked.

"Certainly," I replied.

"Yay!" he clebrated. Rejection of marriage forgotten, out came the sun again.

We enjoyed tea and breakfast and I made a bit of a pig of myself again. My body had been playing tricks on me, trying to tell me that it wasn't really as hungry as it was but when I saw the tray of food I nearly attacked it and the person carrying it. We were joined by Celena and Allen. I asked Celena quietly when Allen wasn't paying attention (he was listening to Chid ramble on with some story of his) if Dilandau had come back at all that day and she gave me to understand that for the first time in months her mind was completely quiet. I turned to Allen to ask him how long it was going to be before we reached our destination when I found him looking at me with an amused expression.

"What?" I asked.

"Chid has just told me that he proposed to you, and you turned him down," Allen said, looking amused. He was teasing me.

"Gently," I defended.

"This is getting to be a bit of a tradition you know," Allen said, puckish smile hanging around the corners of his mouth. Ha ha. Very funny.

"You'd better hope he doesn't have boy-children when he does marry," Allen continued, needling at me. "Or else you'll be importuned by the next generation."

"Well by then I'll be an old granny," I said. "And probably won't have to worry about it."

Chid and Kessa looked blank as to the by-play and I didn't necessarily feel like enlightening them as to Allen's long ago proposal of marriage. He wasn't carrying any candles I was sure (I'd have seen it in his aura if he were) and Sir Allen Schezar viewed me as more of a little sister than a potential lifemate. And speaking of lifemates for Allen...

"So Allen," I said slyly, turning the tables on him. "Are there any wedding bells in your future? Any special ladies? Come on, I'm your friend, you can tell me."

"Not as such, no," he replied with a droll look.

"Not a one?" I needled. "You're not getting any younger you know."

"Ha ha missy," he said dryly. "I'll have you know that I've been quite busy. After mother died and I ran off the estate was left to ruin pretty much and it required much in the way of repairs and paying of back-taxes owed. Plus a staff had to be interviewed and new furnishings in some of the rooms purchased as well as a mountain of other minutae. It was a lot of work. And then there were my duties to the crown on top of that. I couldn't have done it without Celena."

Allen shot and affectionate glance at his sister who blushed demurely. This was a surprise; normally Celena looked so... well, mousy is the word that comes to mind. It appeared that she had a back bone of sorts after all.

"Since you've come with us I assume that your estate is entirely in order by now?" I asked, to make polite conversation. It was a little odd to really think about Allen being a nobleman of rank. Very odd.

"Yes," he said, warming to his subject a little. "I'd forgotten how lovely the estate really is once everything was finally in order."

"When we first got there," Celena said, joining the conversation. "Everything was so dark and cobwebby. All the furniture had been covered with cloths and there was dust everywhere. It was so thick on the floor that Brother actually left boot-prints behind him, like in the snow."

"What a cleaning job that must have been!" I said in dismay and amazement.

We continued along this vein both of them telling me of repairs and upgrades to the kitchen and other rooms. The young Duke and his new friend grew bored with this and went off to find something interesting to do. I was still feeling tired so when the conversation wound down I pleaded weariness from the events of the previous day and they left me in peace to my nap.

It was roughly an hour later when I was roused from my sleep by excited pounding on the door.

"Hey!" cried Dryden's voice from the other side. "Hey I think we're here! Get up on deck and verify!"

And that's all for chapter five. Sorry I posted so late but I was sick these past few days and didn't have the energy to get on the computer and post. I want to thank everyone who reviewed; MissRule, AvelynLauren and Silver Blossom. Glad you're all enjoying it so far.


	6. Chapter 6

I hurriedly rubbed the sleep from my eyes and scrambled out of bed. On my way out to the deck O grabbed my mesh bag of snorkeling gear. I'd packed it just in case Amano and Yukari should suddenly turn capricious on me and decided to go to the beach after all. I loved snorkeling and there were some very prize reefs off the coast of Japan. Hey, this was exciting stuff!

On board the top deck I found that we were hovering just off a wild rocky coast, there were shoals and rocks of all sizes jutting up into the waves that were breaking over them in wild splendor. And there it was... only it wasn't part of the mainland like I'd originally thought; the draconian-shaped cliff-face was actually an enormous cluster of reef-stones that were shaped like a draconian bending over with its wings stretched, looking off to the sea.

"That's the one!" I cried, pointing.

"I don't see an entrance," Dryden said dubiously.

"It's underwater," I explained. "The only way to reach it is to dive in and swim up through the underwater entrance and to the air pockets in the cave system. I can show you the way... which is actually why I have my gear here."

"Hey we brought ours!" Yukari said eagerly. "We're coming too!"

"Me too!" said Chid.

"Not without me," Allen cautioned.

"Or me!" Millerna added, jutting her chin out in that defiant way she had.

"Hold it, hold it," Dryden said waving for calm and silence. "I can appreciate that everyone wants to go on the fun part of the expedition but having too many people swimming underwater in a darkened cave system is a good way to get one of those people lost and drowned."

"Dryden's right," Allen seconded, looking sour at having to agree with the man. "Furthermore we don't know for certain what's down there. The person or people who originally hid the mirror didn't want it found so it's a safe bet that there's booby traps."

"If there are, I'll know," I said. "Amano, Yukari, much as I hate to spoil your fun this isn't a pleasure trip. You guys could get hurt so you should both stay here."

"But!" Yukari protested.

"Hitomi's right," Amano said, unexpectedly. "As exciting as it sounds, I don't wanna see my babe get sliced in half by some kind of ancient guillotine or riddled with poison darts."

Will wonders never cease? That was two, count 'em, _two_ mature and reasonable statements from Amano in as many days. Well. Perhaps the lad would live to adulthood after all. Yukari looked disappointed but I had the feeling those two would probably find some way to occupy themselves.

"If someone gets hurt you're going to need a doctor," Millerna said quickly with a defiant look to the shocked and dismayed Allen. "And that's me!"

"Millerna's in," Dryden seconded then turned to the princess. "But you're going to have to move with the group and follow orders. Until your expertise is needed, I'm the captain, got it?"

Millerna nodded once, seriously.

"We've got Allen on point," Dryden said, all business. He was obviously experienced in these matters. It really made me wonder how many of these expeditions he'd put up. I'd have to ask him later about the possibility of founding Asturia's (presumably) first museum.

"I'm coming too," Amano said. "You'll need someone who's knows about cave diving and I've done a lot of it off the coast of Australia with my old man. Besides it wouldn't hurt to have some extra muscle around in case we run into an obstacle."

"Agreed," Dryden said. "Hitomi's the navigator."

"And what will you be doing?" Allen asked pointedly.

"If what I _think_ is down there is really there," Dryden said mysteriously. "My own particular skills will be needed."

"Do you have flashlights on this world?" I asked. "Waterproof ones? If not, I think I have at least one..."

Dryden showed me a globe made of thick glass attached with wire to the end of a stick, the base of the globe was wrapped in hemp or something like it, probably meant to act as a shade. Dryden shook the globe and something swirled silver inside of it and started to glow brightly as any halogen lamp.

"Looks like this world has its own version," Yukari noted.

"Hitomi, as the only one who actually knows her way through the cave system," said Dryden. "You get the blue one. Everyone else, pair up with a buddy and tie lines together around your waists.

"What about me?" piped Chid's young voice from near the edge of the crowd.

"Freid, I think you're just a little too young yet to go on such a dangerous trip," Allen said gently.

"He can come with me," I said. "I'll make sure nothing happens to him." My instincts told me that he would be needed, young as he was. Besides, it was his mission after all.

"Why must you contradict me at every turn?" Allen gritted. "He'd be in danger going down there and we don't know if he can hold his breath long enough."

"It's his mission," I replied. "And there's plenty enough air pockets. He'll be fine."

"That's not the point," Allen pursued. It looked like our prophesied confrontation was going to happen here and now, right in front of everyone. "I don't think exposing a boy to unknown dangers is healthy."

"And I agree with you," I replied, taking him aside for a tiny tete a tete. "But Chid needs to do this, not just for his family and not just for Freid but for himself. He has courage but he needs to be able to see it for himself and one way or another he'll find a way to prove it. Would you rather it be here and now while he's surrounded by friends and fami... er, friends, or later when he has that backstabbing council at his back and questionable circumstances before him?"

"And you're certain that this "test" of yours cannot be avoided?" Allen said skeptically. And gee, he was the first one to believe in my ability foretell the future too.

"I am," I replied. "You saw his court, you saw how they treat him. Aside of Plaktu, no-one gives him any real respect or authority. Sooner or later matters are going to come to a head and he's going to assert his authority and possibly break with them. He'll need to know his own strength before he can do that."

I couldn't help it, it seemed terribly obvious to me; but Allen looked like he'd been hit broadside with a board.

"You're right," he realized.

"Of course I am, so stop arguing and lets get this show on the road."

I checked my snorkel gear while Dryden ordered some kind of longboat loaded up and secured onto a little skiff made of levi-stones to take us down to sea-level. Millerna was tied to Dryden, I hooked Chid up to me, Allen and Amano as our point men got hitched together. The resemblance between them had always been striking but seeing them tied up together made them look like the constellation Gemini. I gave Chid some last minute pointers on snorkeling and diving (including how to hyperventilate so that he could go longer underwater without needing to come up for air) before we climbed into the boat and waited for Dryden to drift us down. On the way down I slathered my little diver buddy with sun-block. He was so fair skinned I knew he'd burn if he didn't have it on.

After making sure the mask was right and tight and sealed to my face I checked the clear on my snorkel and made sure the filter on the top was in good working order. Finally I checked to make sure my flippers were okay. The Gaean snorkeling gear was (understandably) made of different materials than the gear we had on earth; they didn't have access to all the fine water-proof synthetics that the industrialized society of earth could produce but I had to say, the Geans didn't really need them. They used some kind of natural rubber around the face and glass for the face-piece and a very odd looking contrivance that looked like a brightly colored balloon with a sea-sponge growing out of one end of it as a clear-valve. I think it was once some form of sea-life that had been converted to the purpose by an ingenious diver.

I checked to make certain that Chid's was on right and tight, I showed him how to dunk the face-piece in the seawater and then spit in it and swirl it around. Yes, spit; there were chemical defoggers that you could buy to keep your face mask from fogging up but any diver worth their salt would tell you that they were a waste of money. Spit worked better than anything you could buy on the market. "Defoggers" were for suckers. After making a final check of my own gear and that of my buddy's Dryden and Allen steered the little boat towards the Draconian rocks.

The water was a beautiful turquoise blue out there off the coast and when I looked down over the side of the boat it was clear as a bell all the way to the sandy bottom. They hadn't had any storms or vicious tide then. Good.

"Ready kiddo?" I asked, getting a little excited. Chid nodded.

"Final rope check!" Dryden called. Millerna and he double checked each of the buddy-ropes and their knots before giving the signal for us to get in the water. Chid and I plopped over the side and entered the water with a splash. For a moment I was afraid we were going to get caught in the ropes but they untangled fine and we waited nearby for the next pair to enter the water.

All assembled, I gave the follow me signal and we all put our faces in the water. It was an easy paddle across the surface and the reef was riddled with beautiful brightly colored plants and anemone that waved gently in the tide. I loved snorkeling! It was like an entirely different world down there, so bright and beautiful. The colors were so brilliant that they would have looked garish elsewhere but there was something about the luminous blue of the water and the white of the sand that made them seem as natural as anything. The fish on this reef of the coast of Nowhere Gaea had some of the most exotic looking fish I'd seen, brilliant colors with froths of lacy fins and long tapered whiskers flitting this way and that as we passed overhead. The luminous polyps of the coral darted back inside their pipes as we passed by them and then slowly peeked back out once we'd passed. Fans of crimson and yellow and lime green swirled gently in the rolling motion of the waves, snapping into a long hollow tube when they detected any motion nearby.

All too soon we came near the entrance to the undersea caverns and I paused to tread water for a moment while Chid and I waited for the other teams to catch up. I had him wait on the surface while I secured our guide rope to the outside of the cave with a piton and then resurfaced to hyperventilate some more. At last with a final deep breath we dove under and swam toward the hole in the reef rocks.

Despite the fact that I had a flashlight the cave was pure blackness all around me. The guide rope I was unreeling behind me was made of some odd Gaean fiber that glowed faintly in the darkness. I was relying almost entirely upon my internal pendant, the one I could summon inside my eyelids, to guide me in the dark. After a minute or two my chest started to burn and I began to worry about Chid who was much smaller than me being able to last. At last my pendant jerked upwards, signaling that there was an air pocket above me. I arched my back to surface, and a moment later my head burst through.

Chid was panting a little bit and I worried.

"Are you alright?" I asked. "Do you want to turn back?"

Chid shook his head no and said

"I've been practicing, I can hold my breath for three whole minutes."

"Well according to my vision you shouldn't have to last that long," I said, feeling relieved. "There should be an air pocket every minute and a half from here on in."

Allen and Amano surfaced next, neither of them winded. They were followed by Millerna and Dryden.

"Hey look at that," Amano said, pointing. I shone my Gaean flashlight at where he pointed and discovered that the air pocket had led to a tiny cavelet with a shelf eroded into it above the high water mark. On this shelf someone had left behind evidence that we were not the first ones to explore this cave. It looked like one of the ancient statues of Hindu gods and goddesses with their animal heads and multi-armed torsos in poses of dance or war or repose that I'd seen pictures of. This one looked to be of some solid precious metal; it had a human-looking face but instead of many arms it had great wings stretching out to either side. In one hand it held a sword, in the other a huge jewel that winked in multifaceted splendor at us. Wow.

"Let's have a closer look," Amano said making to paddle over and climb up.

"Wait," Allen cautioned him. "It could be some kind of trap. Have Hitomi verify it before you go any closer."

Obligingly I switched to my Othersight and tried to poke and prod at it with my powers. Abruptly it flared up with pinkish light in an aura around it.

:**WHO**: it demanded, sounding like a deep-voiced old man grumpy at being disturbed from its slumber.

"Hitomi," I answered. "I'm with the Duke of Freid."

:**FREID**: it demanded.

"Yes, Freid," I answered.

:**THEIVES**: The voice didn't have to even form complete sentences, there were layers and layers of side information that trickled into my mind along with it's simple spoken queries. Like I knew that it and its other kindred that riddled each air pocket along the route to the central chamber had been set up to test the intentions and honesty of the persons coming to seek them. The statue had been given a jewel to tempt mere treasure seekers and a sword to dispatch them with once found.

"No," I said. "We're not thieves. Chid is here to recover his family artifact and I am helping him with that."

I felt with my odd powers the sense of being weighed and measured by that ponderous presence and then, suddenly it drew back from my mind. Beside me, Chid suddenly stiffened. His eyes went wide and blank and I grabbed his waist to keep him from ducking under as his entire body went rigid. Because I was touching him I got it too, _stupid_ _powers_.

Scenes flooded into my head like water being poured into a glass. I saw a miser, a grasping and pathetic man, who lived a sad life with nothing but his constant need for more and more money. I saw a group of brigands sitting by the side of a road waiting for a caravan to pass by; they slaughtered the guards and everyone else and made off with the valuable treasure the convoy contained. I saw a powerful nobleman who leaned on his peasant-folk with taxes that barely left them anything to live on while he himself lived lavishly on the fruits of his peoples hard work. Avarice. Greed. There people in this world who's desire for MORE surpassed their sense of right and wrong. People who were so caught up in their own wants that they neglected everyone else; the first man neglected only himself, the second harmed innocents in their quest for riches and the third harmed people who looked to him for protection and justice. A little self-interest would make a person work all the harder, but unrestrained self-interest would turn on the person it originated from in time. It was a wise ruler who would temper the wants of the individual against what was best for all people. A ruler must be the restraining hand, the sword if he must, that would hold the spread of greed in check.

When he came out of his trance Chid turned to me and said

"Zubu told me about avarice. There was so much he showed me... I'll need to think on it a while."

I was surprised. It appeared that here were the guides that Chid needed.

A few minutes later the presence in the statue released him as well and moved on to the next in our party. Apparently we were all going to be weighed and measured before we were allowed to proceed. None of the others appeared to receive the visions that Chid received so I assumed that they were all just being weighed for their intentions before being allowed to proceed.

After another minute or two we were all allowed to pass on. It was another long interim in the dark before my pendant bonged again. Chid and I surfaced in another cavelet and there on a shrine before us stood another statue, this one holding a scale in it's hands. I was stuck for watching Chid's little advice montage because if I let him go he'd probably drown and I couldn't block out mister Guardian Spirit with my untutored gift.

This one was about balance, so I naturally saw different scenes revolving around keeping a balance. There was keeping a balance between the needs of the many and the rights of the few, one about balancing the reasoning intellect against the true heart, one about balancing the letter of the Law and true justice, and more along the lines that a good leader would need to rule well. Weighty stuff, that. I was glad I was in no such position of authority; I would surely go mad within a day.

"Did you see that Hitomi?" Chid asked when he emerged and I was shaking my head to clear it.

"I saw, but I doubt that your Guiding spirit spoke to me like he did to you. After all, these are not my Guides but yours."

"Karsha is the Spirit of Balance," Chid explained. "He is the Guarding Spirit of all those who mediate disputes in Freid. He said he was most often called upon by those in the wrong and that there had been times when he had put it upon himself to show up."

I grinned. Oh, to be a fly on the wall in that situation. I could just imagine some bandit fellow saying "Karsha as my witness!" and the demi-deity showing up and proving him to be the liar he was. Heh! Served him right.

"How many of these Guarding Spirits does Freid have?" I asked. "I though the people worshiped the Draconians in Freid."

"We do, but some Draconians in particular have lived such pure and good lives that they are elevated as special Guardians in their Virtues."

"Rather like Saints being canonized in some Christian religions," I said, understanding. "How many are there?"

"Nine," answered Chid. "Balance, Avarice, Humility, Delight, Compassion, Respect, Prudence, Control and Perseverance."

I imagined that there would be nine little cavelets on our way into the chamber of the Mirror then. Well, it could be worse, the place could be booby-trapped like you saw in Indiana Jones movies. Our party caught their breaths and submerged once again with me and Chid leading the way.

The next chamber featured Telahn, the Spirit of Compassion, and the next Oki the Spirit of Respect. Chid god his advice and communion with each of them as the Duke of Freid. If those Guardian Spirits kept it up the poor boy was going to have a headache. Me, thankfully, they ignored. I wasn't in line to become the Duke of Freid so this lesson wasn't for me; I probably wouldn't even be seeing the images if it weren't for my powers but that was the price one paid, I suppose.

Finally our party reached the tenth chamber after passing through all of the mini-cavelets devoted to the Nine Guardian Spirits. The tenth cave was huge! It was also a perfect round dome, like a scoop of ice cream turned upside down. We swam over to one side and there was a holder of some sort, in front of a mirror. At first I couldn't figure out the significance until Dryden slipped his torch into the holder and the room suddenly flared up in brilliant light as the light from the torch reflected onto the mirror behind it which reflected that light to a system of mirrors throughout the chamber. How very efficient.

The walls of the chamber were polished glassy-smooth and they had stylized pictures of some stuff that made no sense to me upon first glance. There were some Draconians, I could tell what they were by their wings; there were some funny skinny-looking stick-figure-men, and there were a few frames involving Fortona Temple and the power spot hidden there. There were ancient runes in between the frames of the separate pictures, probably telling the stories of whatever the pictures were about.

"Where's the Mirror of Truth?" Chid asked, looking around.

Funny, I was wondering the same thing myself.

"This was the cave I saw in my vision," I answered, my voice betraying my puzzlement. I could feel it nearby but...

I looked up. Huh?

"There it is," I said, pointing. _Hovering in midair_ there it was. It didn't appear to have anything supporting it nor was there any kind of line or string that I could make out; yet there it was turning lazy circles in the reflected light.

"How are we supposed to get to it?" Millerna wondered. "There are no pedestals or steps or anything and it's way too far for anyone to reach."

"Is there a Draconian in the house?" Dryden joked dryly.

"Maybe we can just climb up the side of the wall," Amano suggested. "And come down from above it."

"That's odd," Allen noted. "The walls are as smooth as glass, and oddly slippery too."

"Well that just shot down my notion," Amano muttered.

I wasn't the only one distracted by the walls however. Dryden was raptly staring at the runes in between the panels, his mouth moving silently and his brow skewed up in concentration.

"Are you actually able to translate this all in your head?" Millerna asked him, sounding impressed.

"Not if I'm interrupted," he said in that distracted half-hearing manner.

"I bet my way's faster," I muttered swimming over to touch the wall and probably get bowled over by a vision as had happened in Atlantis. Sure enough, upon contact I flashed into a scene shortly after the destruction of Atlantis and the creation of Gaea.

They had come in different waves, each of them had carried a different dream of how the world should be. There was the Ispano Clan, who had helped to build the Great machine, but now wished to keep the secrets of their technology safe from the greed and arrogance that had destroyed Atlantis. The Draconians had wanted to atone for their previous arrogance by seeking a humble life in servitude to the Gaea Device and communion with the world they'd created. There were people who were deeply attached to nature and animals, who sought to protect the precious balance of nature on the surface world, so they assumed a shape that was a blending of human and animal in order to better become part of that world. There was a clan of shapeshifters that wished to assume any form at will in order to understand all different ways of life and to protect the precious Gaea device. And lastly, there were ordinary humans; people who wished to forge a new life for themselves on this precious new frontier.

When they had arrived on Gaea they had all met in council to discuss how this future would of theirs would run. They divided the land and their peoples duties to it up fairly after much discussion. The Draconians would guard the Great Seals that interacted directly with the great machine. It was their sacred duty to guide the flows of power and keep the natural energy and order of the world in balance. The Bestiarii, the Demi-human people who had taken on a new shape, would become part of the natural world; they would interact with the elements to ensure that all ran smoothly and to keep the future advances of Man to a manageable level. The Zengu Clan, later known as the dopplegangers, were tasked with the protection of the Power Spot in what later became the Duchy of Freid. The people who chose to remain fully human were gifted with special Artifacts that would solve whatever problems arose with the Gaea Device in the future; and so they too would serve to aid the world they had helped create.

The Mirror of Truth was given to a young lord called Freid by the Draconians after a split in the Zengu Clan. Half of the Clan had decided to use their shape-changing abilities only to profit themselves and not to serve Gaea as their ancestors had intended. Sensing this evil intent might one day come to bear against the very power spot their ancestors had sworn to protect, the Draconians, guardians of the sacred power of Gaea, had gifted the liniage of Freid with a precious mirror that would always see the truth of Self.

The sect of the Zengu Clan who called themselves the Dopplegangers tried to steal the Mirror so that Freid or anyone else did not have to power to see through their disguised shape so the current Duke of Freid at the time of the sundering of the Zengu Clan asked the Draconians that they worshipped to hide the mirror in a place where only a worthy duke of Freid would have access to it.

The key to the power spot would also allow access to the Mirror.

I blinked suddenly finding myself back inside my own mind and body. Amano was treading water with his arm around my waist (and one of his hands on my breast) keeping my head above water.

"Next time you do that," Allen suggested from where he swam beside us. "You might want to make sure you have something to hold onto so that you don't drown."

"Good suggestion," I said, shaking off the last vestiges of that weird hot-tingly vision-feeling. "Okay Amano, you've had your fun, hand off my breast please."

"Aww," he said disappointedly. "Don't I at least get a little perk for saving your life?"

I saw that his aura was the vibrant purplish-pinkish-red of lust (and in most guys, arousal) and so I grinned wickedly at him and teased

"By the looks of things, you're already perky enough."

The pervert only grinned back at me, completely unabashed, and said

"Baby, you can perk me up any time."

I promptly dunked his head underwater. Gods, this guy was so...

"You perv," I said as he surfaced, flicking water out of his eyes. He grinned at me as I continued.

"I wonder how Yukari finds the energy to keep up with you, you're always ready to go."

"Well if you're really that curious," he replied. "You're welcome to join us any time you want."

I sat there for a moment trying to get the image out of my head, I only succeeded in lodging it in there further and making myself blush heavily.

"I _so_ did not need that mental image," I said at last. I turned my thoughts to business.

"Chid," I said. "That ancestral sword-key of yours is also the thing that will enable you to have the mirror."

He wore the thing at all times... rather like Van in that way. We had tried to convince him that it might be dangerous to take it with him on this underwater trip, it might get tangled in his legs or get lost and fall off but he'd insisted that the Key of Freid would always remain with the rightful ruler (more of that divine right of kings idea so prevalent here on Gaea) so he'd brought it with him. As one our eyes started looking for the keyhole and it was Dryden (as usual) who followed the path of the reflected beam of light until in shone down into the water.

Chid and I took a deep breath and followed the beam of light as it danced beneath the water all the way down to the bottom of the cave floor. My ears were sore from the pressure by the time we reached the lion statue on the floor of the cave. Chid, hovering in the water nearby, thrust the tip of the Key in the Lion's mouth and the lions eyes lit up with pinkish light. We could feel the water turn warm about us and suddenly churn. a large, perfectly round chunk of the sandy bottom around the statue suddenly detached from the rest of the floor and rose up before us; taking the two of us unexpectedly with it. We broke surface on top of the pedestal a moment later and continued up through the air, the mirror growing closer with every moment.

When it stopped, the mirror was hovering at about ankle-level on a standing person. Chid and I were still prone from the ride up to it and so when it turned in mid-air it caught our reflections.

I saw Chid as a young man, tall and handsome as his blood father had ever been; he was out on the balcony of his palace making some kind of decree and the people below him were cow-towing over some of them smiling and crying in happiness, his Council ranged beside him looking on in reverence and pride. He had all of the makings of a great Duke. However, after that image of greatness showed a darker, more sinister image; that of a young man sitting on his throne his court bent over around him in reverence as he issued a decree... but instead of awe or joy on their faces, there was fear. The council that ranged to either side was grim and silent, and Chids face was shadowed with pride and intransigence.

The dangers of rule then, both his greatest strengths and his greatest weaknesses.

I did not want to see my own reflection in the Mirror of Truth but my eyes were unable to look away when it pivoted towards me. I saw myself standing before the table in a bazaar with the power of the world spread out before me, the magician selling the power waved a cautionary finger at me, reminding me that if I took the Gift I was responsible for it. I made a face at the thought of all that work and allowed my eyes to be distracted by all of the shiny pretties in the stalls around me then wandered off to squander my money on useless articles; turning my back on responsibility.

That's it? I thought. Isn't there a better image of me? 

I had to be honest with myself however; for the few days after I had recovered from my conversation with Lady Varie and my grandmother I had seriously regretted my decision to stick my nose in the affairs of Gaea. I didn't really want to become invoved with their problems as I had the last time. This latest bit with the Seven Seals and the Source Crystals and the new warped Elementals running amuck and needeing to be vanquished before I could even begin to fix those Seals and reestablish the Meridians that fed Gaea… It sounded like too much work! I still considered myself on vacation and so I really didn't want to haul my ass across the face of the Gaean map to face dangerous Elemental creatures who would probably want to see me dead. I had seriously thought about skipping out on the whole thing.

"Oh fine," I muttered aloud to the air around me. "I'll fix your stupid power lines! Mou!"

Chid stood up and grasped the mirror by its frame and stuffed it into the secure mesh diving bag tied at my waist. The two of us joined hands, took a breath and jumped off the edge of the stone pillar, splashing down into the water below. Dryden was busily translating the ancient runes on the walls of the cave, probably for the purpose of committing it to paper later on. I got pictures with Amano's waterproof camera.

The trip back to the surface was uneventful; no more visions, no guardian spirits or anything. I was relieved to find my feet once more on the deck of Dryden's ship and retired to my chambers to change clothes and grab a nap. The visions and the exertion of fetching the device had left me feeling a little drained. On the trip back to Freid I planned to do nothing more than rest up for what was going to come. I had a heck of a to-do list; I had to figure out a way to get rid of Dilandau for good, I had to get training in my powers before I could start on that Elemental Purifying thing I said I'd do, and to do that I'd have to figure out some way to get that particular training. All that and the only thing I really wanted to do was go and see how Van was doing. Selfish, but there it is; I never claimed to be altruistic or self-sacrificing. I sometimes have a hard enough time just being understanding and mature.

Well that was an adventure. Guess thigs happen as they happen then don't they?

Once again want to thank everyone who reviewed… stay tuned for the next chapter.


	7. Chapter 7

I slept for most of the rest of that evening and spent the rest of the following day up on the deck of the ship being waited on hand and foot by the butler. Hey, after all of this, why shouldn't we have a little pampering? Me, Yukari and Millerna joined by Celena had ourselves a little girly-fest. We did all of those things girls love to do best when hanging out with each other; have lots of good laughs, pig out on junk food, and talk about the guys in our lives.

"...Should completely go for him Hitomi," Yukari was saying. We were currently discussing how similar Allen and Amano looked.

"Go for who?" I asked. I'd zoned out a little because I was currently involved in the delicate task of painting my nails.

"Allen," Yukari said grinning and nudging.

"Been there done that," I said disinterestedly.

"Done what!" Yukari demanded. "Hitomi! And I'm your best friend and you didn't tell me! How cruel!" She winked at me. She was talking about sex again. What was it with this girl?

"I mean we don't see each other that way," I explained. "I love someone else and he wanted a sister-placebo. That was the only real reason he proposed in the first place."

"He proposed!" Millerna gasped, shocked and dismayed. "To _you_? **When**!" she demanded in the next breath.

"You said love, present tense," Yukari jumped in at the same time. Oops, I had let slip way more than I intended to.

"Er... eh..." I hemmed. They were both staring at me with all the intensity of a cat at a mouse hole. Oh gods, they weren't going to leave me alone until I had spilled, and they were my best girlfriends so sooner or later they'd wring it out of me. Yukari wouldn't give up, and Millerna was just as persistent.

"Hitomi..." Yukari said expectantly, leaning forward. There was little she liked better than getting a reaction out of me; I was convinced that was half the reason we remained such good friends, I was an easy mark.

"Anou..." I said discomfortedly.

"I'm your very best friend in this or any other world," Yukari wheedled. "You have to tell me!"

"I like to keep my private affairs private," I said. "Unlike _one_ certain girl I could mention." I looked hard back at her. Yukari was not shy about putting it right out there.

"Tellllll meeeeee," Yukari said. Oh great, she had out the pleading look and Millerna was looking at me with intense interest. Oh put away the red-hot pokers!

"Fine," I sighed. "It was during the war, shortly before the decisive battle at Rampant."

Millerna knew what I was talking about but Yukari was clueless.

"I knew that you and he were... somewhat closer than he and I," Millerna said. "But I had no idea that he'd proposed to you. You never said, and neither did he. I'd just assumed... _Well_. You certainly do like to keep your affairs to yourself."

"So why didn't you say yes?" Yukari asked.

"I am... was... er..." I gave up.

"It's Van isn't it?" Millerna said, the first one to piece it together. I blushed but couldn't hide the happy look on my face at the mere mention of his name.

"It's who?" Yukari asked. "Dragon boy?"

Oh yeah, the only time they'd met Van; he'd been pursued by an enormous fire breathing dragon that had nearly had us all for lunch. Or there was that big metal one he'd scooped me up onto. Yukari oddly enough seemed to remember them both despite the fact that they'd happened on the same day. I couldn't quite get my mind around the idea of paradox so I usually tried not to think about it.

"That would be Van, yes," I said, trying to keep my voice and tone level.

"I thought there might be something there," Millerna said triumphantly.

"Mou," I said morosely. "Was I completely the last one to notice?"

"Yeah," Millerna said bluntly.

"Thanks for sparing my feelings there friend," I said. "Don't be shy, I mean, tell me what you really think."

"Well you were," Millerna said, shrugging helplessly. "Even Merle was worried sick that you two had eloped when you and he snuck off to Fanelia alone together."

"Oooooh!" Yukari said excitedly. "Did you get any? Was he good? As your best friend I claim the right to excruciating details! How long did it last? Did he come first or did you?"

My face turned an unbelievable shade of red as I stared at my friend in amazement. Millerna, thankfully, didn't seem to understand what we were talking about.

"Yukari, hon, much as I love you like a sister... you are so..."

"Yeah yeah," she waved it off. "So tell me what happened, does he have a nice bod? How big is his-"

"Ok-ay!" I quickly interrupted. "I think that's enough of that! Look, Van and I aren't like you and Amano, Yukari; we're a little more sedate than that."

"Didja wanna?" she pressed, missing the point entirely. By this time I thought it was entirely possible that I could die of embarrassment.

"That's aside of the point," I said trying to turn the conversation to something else. But unfortunately I didn't say 'no,' which to her meant 'yes.'

"Look-" I tried to interrupt. No chance, Yukari had taken it and run with it.

"Was he nice? Did you like it easy or rough? All this time and I can't believe you held out on me, sister!"

"Nothing happened!" I exploded in exasperation. Yukari looked at me in shock.

"You were _alone_ for an _entire night_ with a boy _that_ good-looking, and you never _once_ tried to jump him?"

"Noo!" I said. Like duh! She was looking at me like 'what's wrong with you?'

"Why _not_?" Yukari asked.

"Because," I said slowly, counting backwards from ten. "Ummm... well, because. Because neither of us were ready."

"Ohhh," Yukari said nodding in comprehension. Then she decided to needle me about something, I could se it by the gleam in her eyes. "Just like you weren't ready to date any of those nice guys I tried to hook you up with."

"Nice?" I said looking at her in disbelief. "Which one of them was nice?"

"Ichiro Gitkawa was nice," Yukari said. "And you barely went with him for a week before calling it off."

"He's the one who borrowed my cell phone for a day calling all these people on it and charging up the phone bill then refused to pay it back!" I said. I'd had to shell out almost five thousand yen for that little asshole.

"Oh yeah, that was him," Yukari said. "Well what about Hirofumi Ureshita? He had a nice car. He was fun right?"

"He was fun right up until the point I try to hold a conversation with him about something, anything, important and he gets this glazed over look in his eyes. His idea of studying for an entrance exam is to ask his daddy for the money to buy a cheat sheet. I'm not a study nerd but I don't want to date someone who doesn't put any effort into anything and thinks I should just fall into his arms because his daddy is rich and he has a nice car and he plays sports. I hated going with him because he treated me like property after only two dates. He was only going through the motions of dating, what he really wanted was to own someone like his pet dog. No thanks, not for me."

"Well what about Keisuke Iwata?" Yukari said.

"He wasn't self-centered or a jerk," I said. "But he wasn't what I would call date-worthy either. Remember that time we double dated together? I didn't tell you this then but when we split off at the club he actually tried to hook up with two other girls _right_ there in front of me! Like I wasn't going to notice."

Yukari took in a breath, looking at me in mingled shock and pity.

"What a skeever!" she declared.

"That's just what I thought," I affirmed. "I was so not having it I left and caught the train home."

"I would have too," Millerna seconded, not having any idea what a train was but getting the gist that I had summarily walked out on the guy.

"Is that when you gave up?" Yukari asked.

"I tried the dating thing but... it just doesn't _work_ if you're already in love with someone," I said.

"He lives an entire _world_ away from you," Yukari said. "Amano and I could work it out even though he was all the way in England which felt like a world away sometimes, at least we could talk to each other regularly. I knew one day he'd come back home to me. You and Van... you're in completely separate universes!"

"Our feelings still reach each other," I defended.

"Yeah but it was entirely likely you'd never see him or Gaea again," Yukari said.

"I don't know what to tell you," I said with a helpless shrug. "The heart does as the heart does."

"It does indeed," Millerna said looking morose. She looked over at me, her aura burning and swirling in a confusing and dizzying array of colors. Uh-oh, here it comes... she was coming to me for advice again. Why me? Why me?

"Hitomi," she started. "I have this friend..."

"Uh-huh," I said, not buying it. "Come on now, Millerna we both know better. It's you, let's just put it out there."

"Okay, guilty," she said, owning up to it. "I have a bit of a... situation."

"I can't promise I'll be able to help," I said. "But since I'm your friend I'll do my best. If nothing else, I'm here for you."

"You know how I've always loved only Allen right?" Millerna said, launching into the dilemma. "I mean, I think I've been in love with him since I first laid eyes on him, when he had to escort my sister to Freid to marry the Duke."

"That sounds like a long time," I said in my best neutral therapist-voice. I didn't actually know how long it was but I was betting a few years. This problem again.

"Yes, exactly," Millerna said, as if that explained everything. My brow furrowed.

"Is there a point?" I queried.

"I've been in love with him for a long time," Millerna said triumphantly. "So he's the only one for me!"

"So if you feel that way," I said. "Where's the problem?"

"I've always thought Allen was the only man I could ever possibly love but... lately."

Ah. So that was it.

"Lately you've been spending your time with someone else and finding that you enjoy it," I surmised. Her aura flared up in surprise.

"Well... yes," she said. "I feel guilty about it, like I'm betraying him or something."

"Has he indicated one way or another that he feels anything deep for you?"

"He seems to sometimes," she said doubtfully. "Like he'll sometimes act to protective of me that it seems like he jealous of other men for coming near me. Or there are times when he kneels to kiss my hand, he doesn't do that for any other girl."

"Does he for Eries?" I asked curiously.

"Eries won't let him anywhere near her. I don't think she likes him," Millerna said.

"Given this and that I can't say I blame her," I said dryly. "I like Allen, he's my friend, and genuinely a nice guy; but he's got such lousy luck with women."

"I don't consider myself to be lousy luck," Millerna said, offended.

"I didn't mean you," I assured her. "I think it's just that he's so handsome all a girl has to do is look at him and she confuses hormones with love. I admit, I'm guilty of it myself, but poor Allen; he's such a nice guy he can't discourage a girl because he's got that chivalry tenet he believes so much in. It a bad combination I tell you."

"Huh?" Millerna said blankly. She wasn't catching my drift here. It looked like I was just going to have to put it out there.

"Millerna Hon, I'm just going to be straight with you. It's quite normal with first crushes to be more in love with the idea of _being_ in love than to be in love with the actual person."

"In love with love?" Millerna questioned.

"Well yeah," I said. "Your heart races and get those hormones going and you get that giddy feeling every time you look at him or think about him. It's a wonderful feeling and by now it's probably habit to you, but aside of the way he makes you feel when you're around him what exactly do you like about Allen?"

"He's... Allen?" Millerna hazarded.

"A good start but are you really thinking of him as a person with all of his faults and flaws or do you have this perfect ideal of what he must be like?"

"Er..." Millerna said.

"For example, what's his greatest flaw or what's the one habit he has that absolutely grates on your nerves!" Yukari asked, jumping in. "For instance, Amano snores when he's drunk, he's a vile bed-hog, and he has this annoying habit of stealing all of my lacy underwear and hoarding it like some treasure trove in his room."

Millerna and I both looked at her rather oddly.

"That's just..." I said, giving her a weird look.

"What about _you_?" Millerna asked, turning to me and shaking her head todismiss what my friend had said about the love of her life.

"I know you and Van... well, you passed Allen over for him, but for most of the time you and I knew each other we were competing over Allen's affection. Why did you suddenly change at the end? And after Allen proposed to you too! You and Van… I know you traveled everywhere together but I could never quite figure out what your relationship was."

"We've always been friends, you know how many times we've saved each others lives Millerna I don't think we could do any such thing unless we absolutely trusted each other."

"There's a big difference between trusted friend and relationship material," Yukari pointed out.

"Oh, Van has his share of faults, trust me!" I said scratching behind my ear. "He does spend a good deal of his time looking kinda mad at the world. When I first met him I was certain he was the last kind of guy I'd ever fall for."

"Oh? Millerna asked, leaning forward. "SO you're saying it wasn't love at first sight?"

"Hardly," I said dryly.

"She slapped him, I remember!" Yukari said gleefully.

"I thought he was rude and arrogant, and the time we spent together in Castello after Fanelia burned didn't do a whole lot to improve my opinion of him," I confided. "He was sullen, and angry; quick to take offense and incredibly hot-tempered."

"But?" Millerna asked.

"But as I got to know him better I realized that there was a lot more to him than the face he showed the world."

"Like what?" Millerna asked curiously.

"That, I am afraid, is between me and him," I said. "Besides, this isn't about me."

"Just one more question," Millerna said. "I remember there was one time when you seemed resolved upon Allen or at least that's what Ereis told me."

"Keep in mind," I said. "Eries may have had her own reasons for telling you that, but yes; there was a point when I thought that staying with Allen was what I was going to do."

"How did you know that it was Van you loved and not Allen? How did you know?"

Not an easy question. I mean, how do you explain to some one else that moment of revelation when all of the little mysteries in your life suddenly become clear and the world seems to fall into place? Nevertheless, if it would help Millerna with her own problems I was resolved to try. I took a deep breath and tried to put something into words that only my heart knew.

"When the Zone of Absolute Fortune spread across the world and I saw Van and Allen fighting, I realized that I cared more deeply for Van than I had let myself believe. I worried about him all the time, worried that he was happy or sad, and I believed in him more than I believed in anything else. We could disagree with each other, even have out and out fights, but despite our misunderstandings, we never lost our faith in each other. I'm free to be myself with him and he with me because we could each trust the other to accept us for what we are. He knows I get confused, and that I get scared sometimes, and that I'm almost always the last to believe in myself but that doesn't matter to him; he believes in me and loves me anyway just as I do him."

"But you chose to leave him," Millerna said. "You love him so much and yet you went home. I don't understand that."

"There's something to be said for someone who loves you enough to let you go," I said. "Love isn't about keeping the one you love close and binding them with fetters, it's about doing what's best for the one you love simply because it is best and you love them."

"How do you know it wasn't best to stay with him?" Celena asked, joining our conversation for the first time. I'd quite forgotten that she was there with us, she's so quiet.

"I don't," I said. "Not really. I can only say that I wasn't ready to leave my world and family behind."

"Not to mention her very best friend in the entire world," Yukari added. "I'm glad you came back to me and your family on the world where you belong but there's something so sad and poignant about the story of lovers parted by an entire world."

I really didn't feel like making any reply to that, besides Yukari had her "oh that's so romanitic!" face on at that moment.

Millerna was the next to break the silence when she said

"You're on Gaea now Hitomi, surely you have plans to see him?"

"If I can," I acknowledged. "I really want to, but I'm wary about making any wishes just now; this world always seems to react strongly to anything I wish for. I just want to take it easy and have as much fun as I can while I'm here."

What I so carefully was not mentioning was my slight worries about what lay ahead of me. I still had to take care of Celena's problem with Dilandau before I headed off for that training and then the matter with those Seven Seals on my to-do list. I didn't really want to think about it much then but my conscience reminded me that not thinking about it wouldn't make it go away either.

"I once had you do a reading for me before I got married to Dryden and you later told me that you'd read the cards wrong," Millerna said. I winced. My concience still yelled at me about that one to this day. As a friend and as a spiritual advisor my first and foremost concern should be an honest representation of the truth, otherwise it just doesn't work.

"Yes, well, I actually tried to replace the ending card with another one in order to change the future," I said. "But the real problem was that I was reading the spread completely wrong in the first place."

"So what was the reading?" Yukari asked curiously.

"Millerna wanted to know whether or not she should marry the man her father had picked out for her or if she should continue pursuing the other one," I explained, mentally apologizing to Allen for calling him "the other one."

"Then what did the cards really say?" Celena asked curiously.

"Umm, well..." I hesitated. The subject of the reading was right in front of me and she could hear every word I said about her. Some of the things might not be very diplomatic to say out loud. "I'm not sure how to put it, it might not be the most complimentary thing you've ever heard."

Millerna looked at me curiously. "Not complimentary?" she asked.

"Just pretend you're reading for me," Yukari said cheerfully. "That way you can be brutally honest."

"I've never been that good at brutal honesty," I admitted. "I tend to like to sugar-coat things so they don't hurt as bad."

"You were trying to spare my feelings?" Millena asked. "What was so bad in that reading that you didn't want to tell me?"

"You had a lot of fives, I remember," I said, thinking back.

"You said fives are for disruption, grief and chaos right?" Yukari said. She knew the meanings of the cards almost as well as I did because she would always watch me do it. There was one time in my freshman year of High School that the track team used me to make a tarot reading booth for the spring festival.

"Yes, just so," I said. "I remember that even though she had a lot of cards with negative connotations they were balanced out by some good ones in the right places. There was a three of serpents for the positive birth of a new undertaking, and an ace of birds that meant strength in adversity. But there was also the Devil, The Tower, The five of fish, and the five of beasts as well as the Moon. It was the moon card that I didn't want to tell her about."

"What's so bad about it?" Celena asked.

"The moon means self-deception," Yukari said quickly before I could stop her. I shot her a look and she said

"Hey, you're not going to help anyone if you can't be strait with them. You should thank me for it."

"Thanks," I said dryly. "Well I suppose since the event is already so far in the past I might as well just tell you. Basically the moon was in the position of repetitive behavioral patterns and that said that you had a habit of deceiving yourself. Your present card said that you had the strength to overcome great adversity but the card of forthcoming circumstances was the Devil. The Devil is a card of bondage; that means chains that you've made _by_ yourself _for_ yourself and only you are the one who can break them. The next few cards said that you felt very pressured to make a choice and that in your heart you were expecting it to be a disaster. So over all, your spread said that you while you couldn't let go of the past you wouldn't be able to move on to the future. So if you couldn't resolve the internal problems you were going to be unhappy for a while yet."

"Oh," Millerna said. "That's pretty different from what you originally said."

"All things pass through a frame of reference," I replied. "I was kinda wigging-out myself at the time so I wasn't able to see things objectively."

"That's understandable," Millerna said. "I saw exactly what you were talking about for myself a little later on. I realized that neither of the two men in my life could make me happy if I wasn't happy inside my heart."

"Exactly," Yukari said brightly. "And now that you are happy inside you heart, which one of them do you want?"

"Good question," Millena said, sounding depressed. "Why don't we go back to picking on Hitomi?"

"Hey!" I said. "Leave me out of this!"

We all laughed together and the conversation turned to other trivialities until we girls parted ways to go and do other things. It was a nice break to have before I had to get serious. I wound up back in my room and decided that it was time to stop goofing off and start getting a little bit of business squared away. To that end I needed a little help.

:Folken: I called off into the spirit realm, knowing full well he'd hear me. He'd either appear before me or I'd go looking for him and drag him here. As far as I was concerned he had a few favors that he owed me; I'd convinced Van to let him have asylum in Asturia during the war and I'd helped him reach Dornkirk at the end just before he'd died. Even though I'd done it because it was the right thing to do and not in order to collect favors later on; it still had to count for something right?

:What: he asked, sounding a little grumpy (well, to be honest, Folken always sounded kinda moody, he and his brother were always more alike than either of them would admit).

"I need your help with something," I answered. This conversation would probably sound weird to anyone listening from outside; they'd thing I was talking to myself.

:You need my help: he said. :That's odd, usually its the other way around. What can i do for you:

"Celena's got a problem with you-know-who," I replied. "I locked him away for a little while but he's getting worse. Isn't there any way we can get rid of the little parasite for good?"

Folken chuckled at my description.

:Little parasite: he said. :I suppose that's as good a description as any although I would have added the words obnoxious and disobedient. I always hated having him under my command because he could never follow orders; I'd tell him to zig and he'd zag. Well anyway, that's neither here nor there I suppose anymore as I have no more troops to command now.:

"Well Celena's getting scared and desperate," I said. "She doesn't want to visit the Sorcerers from Zaibach for obvious reasons and I don't know how to exorcize his psychotic little ass out without doing possible damage to her. I got a look at her a day or two ago and he's wrapped himself around in there like a tree root. I could try to untangle him but at my current level of skill and training it would be like me trying to perform brain surgery with a machete."

:I transferred out of the Sorcerers when I heard about their Fate Redirection experiments: Folken said apologetically. :I don't know a whole lot about Dilandau, his condition, or how to reverse it I'm afraid. My apologies.:

"Are you sure there's nothing you can think of to help?" I pressed. "You're a pretty smart guy, surely there must be something you could think of...:

Folken obligingly paused and thought for a while.

:Well...: he said hesitantly after a good while. :There is one thing you could look at but...:

"But what?" I pressed.

:But I don't know if they'd want to help you: he said. :They're a pretty insular lot and they don't like visits from outsiders. Hell, I discovered that they don't even like visits from half-kin.:

"Who doesn't?" I asked.

:The Draconians: Folken replied reluctantly. :I discovered this when I was sent as a diplomatic envoy to one of their Enclaves. Dornkirk wanted to investigate them once for their connection to the power of Atlantis, but they told him to shove off.:

"Smart folk, considering what happened to Leon Schezar," I quipped. "Besides, even if they didn't want to help me with this, they'd have to help me anyway. I don't think it's coincidence that I've been told to seek them out now that I think on it."

:What do you mean: Folken asked.

I gave him a brief explanation on my future quest as soon as I got Celena's dilemma out of the way concluding with

"...and since I'm going to be visiting them anyway to get their help with Celena, I might as well try to enlist their aid in this quest for those rogue Elementals. The least they could do is show me how to seal them away."

:Ah yes: Folken said dryly. :She told me about your little... er, discussion.:

"So where can I find a Draconian Enclave then?" I asked, getting back to the important matter.

:There are several across the face of Gaea," Folken replied. :The main one is at the Holy Spring Ubdo on the southeastern edge of Fanelia. That's the one my mother is from. If anyone has the information you're looking for it'll be them.:

"Good!" I said cheerfully. "You can go now."

:No: he said consideringly. :I think I'll stick around. You're quite the unknown element Hitomi, and you always manage to make things interesting for me.:

"Do what you want," I said shrugging. "Just don't make me look any weirder than most people already think I am. It's bad enough I keep getting weird freaky visions but if I start talking to my "invisible friend" people are going to be absolutely convinced that I'm crazy."

:We wouldn't want that: Folken sid agreeably.

He floated along behind me as I went to seek out Celena to tell her the good news. She was arranging some flowers in a vase on Millerna's dressing table and thank heavens we were alone (well, aside of the ghost hanging about we were alone).

"I have good news and bad news about your condition," I said by way of greeting. "The good news is that I may have found a possible solution to it. The bad news is that since it involves a serious side-trip you're going to have to let the cat out of the bag in order to get your cure. It's not something I can take care of just between the two of us."

"Oh," Celena said, looking both relieved and incredibly nervous. I'd leave it to her to drop the bomb, I had to go to my two friends and discuss plans for my future journey. I wasn't sure if they'd want to come and I didn't want to be an inconveinience to them.

When I paused outside the door however I found that Yukari and Amano were already busy... loudly busy. Well, I'd just come back later.

:Are they married: Folken questioned. I started in surprise; I'd almost forgotten he was there.

"No," I replied.

:But they're having-: Folken said, sounding shocked.

"Yes, I know," I said, really wishing I weren't having this conversation. "It isn't as big a deal where we come from. They're monogamous, they're protected, and their parents are okay with it so who are we to censure them? Besides, they're very happy."

:Sounds that way anyways: Folken said dryly.

"Hitomi?" Chid asked, coming upon me and my invisible friend. "Who are you talking to?"

"Well, there's this and that..." I said in embarrassment at being caught out.

"Guess what?" Kessa said from beside her young Duke friend. She really seemed a bright and cheerful little girl, a good companion for Chid.

"What?" I questioned, playing along.

"Allen's going to give Chid his first sword lesson," Kessa said. "He's the best swordsman in all of Asturia. He was even trained by the famous Balgus Ganesha."

"I know," I said agreeably. "Chid's going to have a very good teacher."

I kept my mouth shut on everything else I might have said. I admit to being a little worried that Allen would start to like it too much, that might make him want to be around Chid all the time because the boy was all that was left of he and his first love Marlene; but Allen was a big boy and could make his own decisions. If nothing else he wouldn't do anything that would endanger his only son.

Dinner that night was a very lively event and not neccessarily in a good way. Celena shocked Allen and everyone else by dropping the bomb on the Dilandau debacle and that put the cat among the pigeons first off. Then I went and told everyone that Celena and I were going to the Holy Spring Ubdo to take care of things. Yukari and Amano were all for the idea of taking a side-trip; we'd brought all of this camping gear with us and despite everything had yet to use any of it. Well that was one worry out of the way, I was partially afraid that they weren't going to like the idea and I'd have to figure something else out. I should have known that my two best friends would stick by me.

Allen didn't take the news very well I'm afraid, I think he mostly felt hurt that his little sister didn't trust in him enough to confide in him. She'd probably have to reassure him later on.

Millena was a little disappointed that she wouldn't get to go along on the trip to Ubdo but there were too many concerns to make it a viable option. When she took off to visit Fried that was one thing because the two countries were allied by her elder sister, but hiking off into the wilds of Fanelia raised a number of diplomatic concerns that would take too long to go into. Besides, her sister was waiting for her back in Palas.

Dryden looked tempted, really he did, but decided in the end to accompany Millerna back to Palas. I kinda wondered what the outcome of that conversation would be, but it wasn't my place to poke my nose in anymore. Besides, I'd done enough damage the first time around really. I was staying out of it now.

We were all received back in Freid with this huge marathon of ceremonies. They made me, my friends and everyone else who'd gone participate. They'd probably been planning the events since we'd left. The downside was that we had to sit through long winded speeches by each of the Council members saying how grateful they were for the return of thier precious relic blah-blah-blah, and the upside was that once it was over we got to party! Oh yeah!

Man, those Freidians, despite them having more preists per captia than any other country I knew of certainly knew how to let it all out. There was fireworks, food and drunken revelry in the streets. My glass of sake (or whatever it was they drank in Freid) was never less than half full for three days.

The evening of the first was a huge feast and I got lots of presents to honor me and my freaky powers. Amano and Yukari got some too, but apparently since I'd made it here for the last war they felt I deserved something special. Mostly we drank a lot. I mean, we drank... A LOT!

On that second morning I woke up with te worst hangover I'd ever had. well, there's nothing like the hair of the dog that bit you I suppose. Folken very cheefully informed me that instead of taking off my clothes when i got drunk (which was what Yukari had done) I started telling some of the dirtiest jokes he'd ever heard. I vaguely recall being surrounded by about ten of the city guard all laughing uproriously about something... I think I told them the one about the three guys stalling out in the middle of no-where and fornicating with the farmers daughter after they'd been expressly forbidden. I grinned at the memory of the punchline. It's a classic.

The second day me Yukari and Amano went out and partied like there was no tomorrow. I still don't remember a lot of details from that day, the whole thing just passed in a daze of drunken revelry. I think I picked up some Freidian style dancing at one point, I don't know how coordinated I was considering the fact that I couldn't tell my feet apart but neither could the guy trying to teach me so it was all good. It was fun to watch Amano and Yukari try to do the electric slide while they couldn't tell left from right and then they joined in with some drunken Freidian to learn the bawdiest drinking song I'd ever heard. I admit, I joined in on the chorus and I sounded just as bad as everyone else slurring along with the words but it was great fun.

It was three straight days of grand good fun, but unfortunately all good times must come to an end. By the end of the third day I was feeling the effects of overindulgence as I never had befroe, because I'd never indulged as much as I had in those three days. It was time to get on with my quest.

I spent a day recovering from the effects of my foolishness and going crazy in the market-place with my best friend Yukari; apparently in Freid, saving the Duke's life and bringing back one of their long- lost artifacts entitles you to a free shoping spree in their expensive bazaar. Me and Yukari had ourselves a grand time as only two best friends who loved to shop and had an unlimited budget could. All I can say is... poor Allen. He thought he'd do the knightly and chivalrous thing and offered to escort us poor defenseless female creatures about the marketplace so we wouldn't get molested by strange men. Heh heh heh... little did he know. "I'll escort you ladies and keep you safe," he said. Yukari and I just grinned at one another; it was the grin of a con-artist who'd just found a wealthy heiress with no common sense. "Sure," we said. "You can come along Allen, we'd be glad to have you as our beast of burden, er, I mean escort." Amano just gave him this piting look; he knew what was coming. Hey, knights had squires, golfers had caddies, women had escorts (or in Yukari's case, a boyfriend). the treasures we found, the bargains we haggled... It was truly a perfect ending to a fun stay.

The next day me Yukari, Amano, Allen and Celena (with the ghostly presence of Folken still hanging about) all met in council to decide the particulars of our next journey. The thing about the Holy Spring of Ubdo was that it couldn't be approached from the sky; it had some kind of protective barrier arund it that destroyed and aircraft that tried to approach it by from above. We could get through most of the journey in the Crusade, but the last week or so when we entered the lands surrounding the Draconian Enclave would have to be made over land. That was okay we decided, we'd take Amano's SUV overland. Our journey would begin on the following day so that evening I bid a fond yet sad farewell to little Chid. He was really a good kid.


	8. Chapter 8

Our first stop was back in Asturia proper. We of course had to actually prep the Crusade for the journey to the Ubdo Holy Springs, but since it was to be a journey of relatively short duration our stay in Asturia would be brief. We had all agreed to use the guest rooms on Allen's family estate (teasing him about throwing a wild party there while he wasn't looking) so as not to advertise our presence there on Gaea to all and sundry. Allen was going to drop by the royal palace to attend to some business he said he had there so me, Yukari and Amano took Celena with us while we went to tour the bazaar.

I had two goals in this mission, well, really three; the first was to hear what I might hear out on the streets concerning these strange monsters that were roaming the face of Gaea, the second was to see what kind of shopping I might find in the main marketplace and the third (shared by my two best friends) was to find the tavern with the best vino in Asturia and see how it stacked up against some of the other drinks we'd tried.

The rumors didn't tell me anything I didn't already know (although there were some pretty wild versions of the tales circulating about) and so I abandoned that mission and concentrated on shopping. The marketplace in Asturia held the widest variety of goods from all over the face of Gaea, it had everything. Fine parchment, beaded jewelry and delicately blown glass from Daedalus, tools and clock-work devices from Basram, scents and perfumes, oils, lotions, made in Cezario, the finest clothes and silks from Egzardia, ivory, jade, spices and incense from Freid, furs, fine metals, gems and raw goods from Fanelia.

Ah, a shoppers paradise. I still had a lot of Freidian currency from the duchy of Freid (more gifts from a grateful kingdom for locating their legendary lost artifact) so I could afford to splurge a little. I didn't see any CD's or mysterious goods from home like I had the first time I'd shopped here but the place was full of other things to catch my fancy. I eyed bolts of sheer, raw silks in flattering colors with an almost lustful eye but reluctantly had to pass them by; I did not know anything about sewing and didn't really have the time or luxury to purchase the skills of a dressmaker (and after seeing some of the things on this world that were considered fashionable I was dubious about the intelligence of making such an offer). Asturian jewelry was gaudy, and not in a fashionable kind of way either. I was nearly certain that the people purchasing necklaces, bracelets and rings in this country paid the jeweler by the weight instead of on quality of craftsmanship.

Asturia is a frou-frou little country, I thought to myself as I passed by a shop with a frothy wedding-cake of a dress displayed in the window, with matching tasteless jewelry no less. It was then that I noted that I was beginning to attract stares. I suppose the people of this country weren't exactly accustomed to seeing a woman wearing fitted slacks, strapy tops and sensible sandals then.

I wonder if I'll ever just get accustomed to being an object of curiosity, I thought to myself. It was a little uncomfortable, but not so much that I was willing to go native either; I'd seen those dressed the women here wore... I'd _worn_ those dresses the women here wore. I'd had to rip off most of the skirt just to be able to move around without tripping. They were pretty bad. Poor Celena, poor Millerna. I'll bet that those dresses that Princess Eries wore were ten times worse. No wonder the girl always seemed so prim and proper; those stiff-necked starch-pressers probably cut off the supply of oxegen to her brain.

Sometimes, I reflected smugly as I watched a bevy of ladies walk around in their lace-stuffed fluff-mobiles. It's good to be a foreigner. 

"Oh my!" Celena said, pausing at the wedding-cake dress display. "What a pretty dress!"

"You've got to be joking!" Yukari and I yelped in unison wearing matching horrified looks.

"You mean you actually like dressing like that?" Yukari said, gesturing to her ensemble that consisted that day of approximately three layers of frothy underthings, a herring-bone corset, a ridiculous rig-out consisting of hoops and strings to make the skirt bell out, a two-layered dress consisting of a lacey white poofy-sleeved bodice and skirt with an overdress on top of it in powder-blue, a darker blue blazer, a parasol, gloves, stockings, uncomfortable looking boots, and... a modest matching cap for her hair. The ladies maid needed a ladies maid just to get dressed in the morning. It was ridiculous.

"Do I look like some kind of hoyden to you?" Celena inquired, sounding scandalized by the notion.

"Can you even move in that thing?" Yukari said. "Seriously, I get uncomfortable just watching you. I'd go stark raving bonkers trapped under all of that clothing."

"A Lady of breeding must exemplify all of the proper standards thereof," Celena said, sounding as if she were reciting by rote. "These clothes are absolutely de riguer for a Lady to be seen in public."

"Princess Millerna doesn't wear all of that," I argued. "And you don't see anyone taking her to task about it."

"My brother and her sister have tried on numerous occasions to remind her that she should dress her station, but my princess is very... strong-willed."

"I'd say she has a brain and a stubborn streak and she isn't afraid to use either of them. More power to her I say," Yukari said brightly. "C'mon Celena... walk on the wild side. Live a little. Try on something a little less... overpowering."

"You don't honestly mean to say that I should walk around dressed... well, dressed like you do you?" She said, sounding aghast. "Why you're practically naked!"

Yukari and I both had a good laugh about that one. I was wearing slacks that went all the way to my ankles and a wrap-stle top with another tie-back under the breasts. The sleeves were loose and three quarter length (though they were of light cotton). I was anything but naked and standing next to Yukari in her knee-length skirt and spaghetti strap top with sandals I was modestly dressed.

"But we're sooooo comfortable," I replied enticingly. "Just think, walking around on this hot afternoon without three layers of heavy clothes dragging at us."

"No corset, no lace, no jackets, no tight boots," Yukari continued in the same vein. Celena looked a little like she was beginning to be convinced.

"But it's so..." she protested, a little feebly.

"No hoopy contraption banging in to everything," I replied. "I can move my legs and raise my arms up past being perpendicular to my body." Something I had noticed that her clothes, cut as they were to conform to her shape, did not allow her to do. They pulled here and rode up there and flounced out there, a person would have to have the grace of a dancer just to move around in them.

"But I could never--" She said, sounding a little dismayed.

"Come on," Yukari said, convincingly (like the devil on her shoulder). "Just try it on."

"I... guess..." Celena said, reluctantly. That was good enough for us, with a whoop and a shuffle we hurried Celena back to Allen's bachelor mansion to begin our little make-over project.

Between the two of us, Yukari and I should have enough clothes to outfit her appropriately. We argued good naturedly about what ensemble would look best with her shape and coloring, plus allowing freedom of movement without being too immodest. Celena looked positively horrified by some of the things we teasingly held up to her, but it was all in good fun.

"I like the pale blue one," she said as we picked through various shirts.

"You wear too many pale colors," Yukari said definatively in a tone that brooked no argument. "Time to try something different. You'll look good in jewel tones I think."

"No red!" Celena and I said in unison as Yukari picked up a favorite red dress-top.

"Suit yourself," she said shrugging. "It doesn't really go with your eye color anyway. I was thinking that lovely teal-blue satiny blouse I have.The grecian-looking one with the long sleeves."

"Did you bring it?" I asked. It would look very pretty on her and it was reasonably modest.

"I had just enough room for it," she said, pulling it out of a side pocket with a triumphant noise. It was the wrinkle free kind of rayon thank heavens and every fold fell just right.

"And the skirt?" I queired. "No grey, what have you got?"

"Purple, orange, blue, green, yick, when did I buy that one?" Yukari muttered as she riffled through the collection of skirts in her third suitcase.

"Black?"

"Perfect."

A modest three-quarter length wrap-style skirt with a faux-slit up one side that revealed a length of black sequins and beads was laid out on the bed under the skirt.

"Very elegant," I approved.

"Where's the rest of it?" Celena asked plaintively.

"She's right you know," Yukari said, eyes twinkling at me. Celena had a moment to look relieved before my friend added

"We forgot the belt, purse and shoes."

We managed to push our dear Celena into playing dress up with us by picking out coordinating outfits, and we got her to hold still long enough for us to do up her face by doing up each others faces. When we looked in the mirror... ah! Perfection!

"It seems a shame," Yukari remarked. "For all of us to get dressed up like this and yet have no-where to go."

I could see the notion being born in her eyes even as Celena said

"I think it's a relief. If someone saw me like this, I think I would just die."

"Let's go tavern hopping!"

"What!" Celena shrieked, sounding aghast, dismayed, horrified and scandalized all at the same time (and in one syllable too).

"She's just joking with you," I reassured her.

"No I wasn't," Yukari said. "We're dressed for it, we should go and have a girls night out on the town. It can be my bachelorette party."

"It does sound like fun, but I don't think her older brother would go for it," I said. Was that ever an understatement; Allen would have a litter of kittens on the spot if we even mentioned taking his precious baby sister out for a night of drinking and debauchery.

"Hey girls," Amano said, poking his head into the room. "There's some guy here who says he's from the palace. He's looking for Celena or Hitomi."

"For me?" I questioned. "Are you sure?"

"That's what he said," Amano replied, shrugging.

Yukari and I followed Celena down to the waiting room on the first floor of the mansion to see a short wiry older man with an ageless face wearing the same poofy-sleeved pinkish shirt and blue and gold overcoat Allen wore.

"Sir Tevon!" Celena exclaimed in surprise, obviously recognizing him. "Why aren't you guarding Princess Eries? What happened, is Allen okay?"

"Near as we can tell missus," he said, apologetically. "That's why I'm here."

"I'm being rude," Celena said, obviously trying to find some equilibrium in her worry by remembering her manners. "Come on out of the waiting room and have some tea."

"No time for that missy," the Caeli Knight Tevon replied. "Your brother and my charge have had a bit of a… falling out."

"Oh dear," Celena said, looking but dismayed and unsurprised. "He told her, didn't he? I _told_ him not to say anything, I tried to tell him that Eries wasn't like her other sisters."

"Waitaminute…" I said holding up a hand to get hold of the conversation. "You're telling me… it's _Eries_ now? Allen and Eries?"

I hear it, but I don't believe it. If ever there were two people to be an unlikely match…

"I mean, no offense here but… she's too _smart_ for him."

Celena made a little noise of insult on behalf of her brother.

"Look, I'm not saying Allen is stupid or anything but we both know that Eries is out of his league, in more ways than one. Let's just put it out there."

"You said yourself that the heart does as the heart does," Celena riposted. "Allen wants to be settled already, he just seemed to think Eries was the one he was destined to be with. It's inconvenient though, why couldn't he fall for some one a little more…" she trailed off.

"Attainable," I finished for her.

"I wouldn't be having this problem if you had just said yes," Celena grumbled.

"The heart does as the heart does," I replied.

"It's neither here nor there," Celena said with a sigh. "I take it she rejected him?" (this to Tevon.)

"Aye Miss Celena," Tevon replied. "That's putting it mildly. What she did was read him chapter and verse his own charter as a knight and his duties to crown, country and chivalry."

"Ouch," I winced. Eries could be cool and intimidating at the best of times, I'd hate to be flayed with the rough edge of her tongue. Part of me was in awe of her, the other part felt sad for her that she couldn't follow her heart.

"Myself and the others… we worry for the boy Lady," Tevon said, his face softening so that he looked more like a kindly old grandfather. "Whatever his transgressions in the past, Allen Schezar has rose above his past pains and attained a sense of purpose as a knight. He has become a true knight, he supports the law when it's in the right and will go against it when it serves only fear or self-interest. He protects the weak, is valiant in battle and kind in peace."

"He just has this one bad habit…" I said laconically. Celena glared at me for making light of the situation.

"Peace, peace," I held my hands up placatingly. "We'll find him, wherever he's hidden himself, and bring him around so that he doesn't get kicked out of the knighthood."

"I and the other knights would be in your debt Lady Hitomi," the knight said bowing to me. "It's been said that you can find anything."

"Just about," I said.

"You should get back to the palace and your duties," Celena said worriedly. "We wouldn't want you to get in trouble yourself over this, even if it was probably at Princess Eries request."

"You understand the situation I see," Tevon replied, looking relieved. It took me a second to catch on, but then it dawned on me. Eries was trying help Allen in her own way; this conversation was strictly off the record and as such, should probably have waited until the knight Caeli who guarded the princess was off-duty but by then the damage would have been done most likely.

Right, well, lets get moving," I said. I searched out with my senses, feeling through the teeming sea of humanity that was the city, looking for that wisp of familiar signature that was Allen. It was a lot like listening to a hundred different radios going off at once and trying to sort out the one playing your favorite song on it. Not an easy task, but once I had found the one playing the song I was looking for, it took only a little work to get a general sense of what direction it was playing in. My heart plummeted however when I realized where he likely was. West. Towards the ocean and also towards the _bad_ end of town.

"Go?" Celena said. "Go where?"

"To find your brother of course," I answered evasively. "I wasn't lying when I said I could find about anything."

"We can't go out dressed like this," Celena protested. "We'll stand out too much."

"We'll wear cloaks over it, no-one will even notice. Besides, if you go out dressed in that ridiculous rigamarole you wear all the time they'll know for certain that you're a "Lady of Breeding" and that'll make us all a target. Besides, in the place we're likely going to end up going you're going to need something you can move fast in."

"And just where are we likely going?" Celena asked with trepidation.

"Dockside," I said shortly. "The taverns there are places a man can drown his sorrows in."

"You're not serious!" Celena said.

In reply I wrapped my hands just as if I were going to spar and fished around in Allens weapons collection for a pair of brass knuckles and finding a fighting pike that resembled a bo enough that I would probably be able to scrape up enough of a memory from when I was a kid to know how to use. I tossed Celena a pair of matched long daggers.

"You know how to use those?" I asked.

"Of course not!" she replied.

"Put them on anyway, just in case."

Amano and Yukari, who had been listening at the doorway came in and said they'd help too.

"I was in kendo for a while when I was a kid," Amano said, picking up a sword and cinching it round his waist. "So I at least have a basic idea of how to use one of these things."

"I don't know much about fighting," Yukari said finding a pair of gauntlets to cover her hands and adding a dagger to her waist. "But I can't let my best friend walk into danger alone. I'm coming too."

"Let's go then, before it gets much later," I said. The sun had set while we were being appraised of the situation with the knight and by the time we reached it it would be full dark. Not a good time to go somewhere dangerous.

"Should we go on foot or ride?" Celena asked.

"The three of us don't know how to ride a horse," I said apologetically. "And if we want to keep this quiet, the party that goes and gets him before he makes a spectacle of himself will have to be comprised of his close friends."

"We could take the car," Amano said. "It'd be quicker and easier."

"Too obvious," Celena said. "Everyone knows that you Mystic Moon people are the only ones with a magic carriage that doesn't need horses, if they saw one at dockside and realized what we were doing someone might get suspicious and start asking questions."

"Well we can't use your carriage," I replied. I knew already that they all had the crest of the Schezar family on it, it'd be like hangining a big neon sign out. "And there's no way we can carry him all the way home. How about if we went halfway?"

"That might work," Celena said. "We could leave your horseless carriage off the side of Broomsweep street and just continue on foot."

As one we nodded and climbed in the car. Yukari was driving this time, with me in the passengers side to tell her which way to turn. At first the neighborhood we drove through were all rich, with fine mansions and well kept walls and lawns. Then the houses slowly started getting smaller. Then smaller and less well kept, then we drove through apartments and finally run-down apartments. We were getting towards the dangerous end of town, the kind of place I'd always avoided when I'd been on Earth and my natural instinct was to turn back and head toward safter ground before something bad happened. But, Allen was my friend and Celena was obviousl concerned for him and his reputation so…

"We'll park it here and go the rest of the way on foot," I said. The four of us climbed out nervously and Celena asked

"Which way?"

I pointed west. I could sense him in that direction. With another glance exchanged between us all, we gathered our courage and stepped out of the safety of the SUV and into the unknown streets. We had our hoods up and our borrowed cloaks wrapped arouns us so that all anyone could see were loaked figures ith indescernable features. I hopped that would be enough to keep us all out of trouble.

Dockside was just as awful as I'd imagined. It was a redlight district with wooden planks. There were trading houses of course, where vessels could be chartered for various purposes. After dark they were all boarded up and abandoned, turning what was probably a thriving trade community during the day into a den of iniquity at night. Women of ill-repute solicited their trade on the corners between trading companies and local taverns. Tough looking men glared about, just seeming to look for trouble. We kept our hands on our weapons and our heads down. The smell of the place was something I was going to do my best to forget about in later nights, part of it was the comforting smell of the sea, but most of it was a mixture of dung, urine, and unidentifiable but unpleasant odors (probably better left unidentified).

After what seemed like forever I at last sensed Allens presence very close nearby. I picked up my pace and we all stopped just outside of a tavern called the Smoking Pig. What a name for a bar. We opened the door.

Uhg! I thought as the smell assaulted us. This place reeked worse than the swamps! The men here probably hadn't seen a bath in years; and that was erring on the side of generosity. Added to that was the thick, sharp scent of rot-gut whiskey layered in with rancid grease from the back kitchens and whatever noxious concoction the house special was. It smelled greasy, and there was something burning on the fire. This place was not high on my list of must-try dining. I'd give it a negative five stars.

"Yick," Yukari muttered grimacing in disgust. "I'm always up for a bit of adventure but this… no."

"I'm with you on that one," Amano seconded. "Lets grab the knight and get out of here."

My eyes focused through the haze of smoke and dim lighting and spied the man we were looking for sitting alone in a dark corner with about five bottles of death by liquor in front of him. He'd already polished off two of them. I sighed, we might just have to carry him out of there.

"Hey Allen," I said sitting down at the table with him.

"Hitomi?" he said, looking surprised through his unbalanced drunkenness. "What on Gaea are you doing here?"

"I could ask the same of you," I replied tartly. "This is no side of town to get drunk on. And besides that, why didn't you just come to us? We're your friends, we'd have understood and helped out."

"Nothing helps," he said hopelessly, looking down into his shot glass. "I can't ever seem to kick this bad luck I have with women. I always fall for the ones I can't have."

"That's a problem," I said sympathetically. "But this…" I gestured to the bottles lined before him. "Won't do anything to solve it. It mightseem like it stopps the pain for a little while but in the end it hurts you worse to run from your problems than it does to fight through them and get past it all."

"How do I get past losing her?" Allen asked plaintively with a hint of savage anger in his voice I'd never suspected. He was talking about Marlene, his first love. "And how am I supposed to just "get over" knowing that there will never be any hope for us?"

"You of all people know that there aren't any easy answers to those questions," I replied. "I could get my cards out right now and tell you your future, but I won't. I won't because they are answers only you can find for yourself, just as your future is something only you can decide for yourself."

"Don't spout traveling-show wisdom at me!" he snapped. I was a little taken aback, he'd never taken a tone like that with anyone, and especially never with a woman. It was as I suspected; Allen had a lot of repressed anger. Really, the man needed a good therapist, not a wife. I could take this one problem at a time then. I couldn't cure all of this bitter emotional hurts in one night, but… well, they did say that bartenders were the original therapists, and people would tell them things that they wouldn't confide in even to their priests.

I poured a mixed drink that looked like it might taste good and started in.

"So. You've worked through most of your anger with your father, gaining closure with him went a long way towards that; but with your mother you still feel deep down somehow that her death was your fault, because you couldn't keep your sister from disappearing."

Allen gasped and looked at me in shock that I could not only know so much about his inner angst-fest, but just lay it out there so baldly to him, as if I were discussing the weather.

"Furhtermore," I went on. "You also blame yourself for Marlene's death. You've convinced yourself that if you had just figured out a way to keep her by your side then she would not have died in childbirth."

"You go too far," he said raggedly. "Even for a friend."

"I go as far as I must," I replied, unshaken by the dangerous color his aura had taken. In surgery, it was necessary to cut the skin in order to get rid of the real problem. I had no training in psychology or therapy, but really… what did all of those head doctors actually know about the field they were in despite all of their fancy degrees? It was a far from exact field. I could only go by my instincts and hope I didn't make too big a mess of things.

"I know it hurts still."

"What do you know about hurt!" he all but screamed at me. "You live safe and comfortable and protected in your world, your family is alive and well, you've probably never known a moment's sorrow or discomfort. How can you talk to me about pain! I've lost everything more than once!"

"Yes, and now that you have as much of it back as you're ever likely to get, you want to throw it all away!" I replied. "I've lost people close to me too Allen. I know it hurts. The day my grandmother died I thought the world was going to end. We were as close as mother and child and I had to find a way around the fact I'd never get her wisdom again. It hurt."

"But you had family to help you," Allen replied. "I never did."

"And what precisely was Balgus to you?" I replied. "Chopped liver?"

That brought him up short, pressing my advantage I pushed forward.

"You're a good man Allen. You've come so far, don't throw it all away over one, or say two or three, heartaches."

He seemed to at least be thinking over what I said but he was taking too long. Time for the coup de grace.

"Besides all of that, your sister still needs you. We have to get her to Ubdo, remember? If you want to make a screw up of your own life that's your business, but remember that your own actions reflect on your family as well. Do you want to repeat the same mistake your father did?"

That should do it. 

Allen looked stricken, shook his head in negation and rose to allow Amano and I to help him stumble out of the bar. We each had and arm draped over one of our shoulders as he weaved this way and that. It wasn't easy, the guy probably weighed as much as I did in muscle alone, but he was able to walk he just couldn't keep his balance while doing so.

The streets of dockside were dark and very sinister. I'd alwas made it a point to avoid the bad part of town and being in it now made me very very nervous.

"Which way?" Questioned Amano. I pointed and we dragged Allen, who had by this point passed out from inebriation, off in the direction where our car waited for us.

We were halfway there when out of the alleyways stepped two short, burly, rather tough-looking men (who incidentally smelled like they hadn't bathed in a year). I could sense right away their intent. And even if I hadn't sensed that they intended to rob us, I think that the knives they were brandishing would have given it away.

Damn. Just my luck, I thought. I poked at Allen and tried to heave him to his feet so he could use that sword of his. He fell forward onto the ground instead.

"My hero," I muttered. It looked like I was just going to have to try something else.

"Give us all of your money," one guy demanded.

"Yeah," his cohort seconded.

I was so not in the mood to play with tweedle-dumb and tweedle-dumber over there. I didn't want a fight, which left using my powers against them. I caught both of their eyes with my own and summoned my Command Voice.

"You shall leave us alone," I ordered them. They stiffened at my tone and looked stupefied for a moment.

"We shall…" one of them mumbled vaguely. To my relief they turned to go. I was about to pick Allen up and hurry on my way when the nominally brighter of the two idiots turned back and said

"Hey waitaminute… you look rich and I aint goin' no-where till you give me your money."

My goodness, greed overrides stupidity. This is so not my night. 

"So what are we going to do?" Amano questioned. "Allen can't fight and we're not exactly skilled ourselves, block and guard patterns in the gym hall is one thing, but these guys weight twice as much as us and they mean business."

"Give them the money," I said. We riffled through Allen,s pockets, Celena brought out her coin purse, And Amano and I took the few freidian coins we'd brought with us out of our own wallets and tossed them on the ground at the theive's feet.

"There, you have your money, now go," I said.

I saw a blue-grey ghost-shadow of the nearest man rush forward to attack, automatically I stepped forward into his swing, seized his attacking hand at the wrist and brought it down and around while I twisted my body, torqued my waist and brought him down over my back and the back of my knee. It was a basic self-defense move, one of the first taught. He landed on his back with a hard thud but was certainly not down for the count. He was about to get up to attack for real when Amano drew his sword and held it point-down at the man's neck.

"Move and you'll regret it," he warned. Meanwhile his friend decided to leap into the fray. He too, rushed at us and scince I was in the lead that made me essentially the frontline.

He charged at me with his short stubby-looking club held high to bash me over my head with. I grabbed his wrist, putting my other arm on his shoulder, then stepped in to trip his lead foot while simultaneously twisting his arm behind him as he fell. In a panic I pinned him there with my knee.

"Now what?" I demanded.

"Can't you use those powers of yours to just… put them to sleep?" Amano asked. "Cause if not, we can always just club them until they fall unconscious."

The guy pinned beneath me struglled a little at that until I put the hurt on him by pulling on his arm a little.

"Works for me," I said. I reached down into myself with my mental powers, praying this would work because I didn't know if I could sit there and club away at a person while they were pinned down and helpless.

"**_Sleep_**" I commanded. I fellt a small shiver of dizziness pass over me, a sighn that some part of my powers was working. An instant later they were snoring peacefully.

"Let's go, before they wake up," Celena said, as she parsimoniously gathered up the coins on the street. Amano and I took Allen in hand again and continued back toward our escape route. We reached the SUV without further incident and Yukari drove back to the mansion without anything else happening.

Celena and I pulled Allen up to his room and laid him out in bed. I felt like and intruder sneaking into a man private apartments. My upbringing rebelled against it. Curiousity won out however and I looked around me a bit. Despite his wealth and status, Allen was actually a pretty Spartan guy; he didn't have a lot in the way of furniture, a bed, a dresser, and armoire (which probably actually held armor) were the sole inhabitants of his room. No rug to soften the floor, no throw pillows, not even any curtains.

"Man," I muttered. "This guy really needs to get a wife."

"I'm sorry?" Cellena questioned, slight edge to her tone.

"Life," I amended. "Need's to get a life." By her look it was clear that that wasn't much better.

"Help me take his boots off," Celena requested after we'd managed to drag, push and pull his inebriated carcass into his four poster bed. "I don't want him getting his bedding messy."

I pulled on one boot while Celena took the other and then doused the lights while she pulled the covers up to his chin. We were about to leave when I said

"You know, I think he got off too easily for all the trouble we just went through," I said. "We should do something to him."

"What? Why?" Celena demanded, sounding alarmed.

"Long and cherished Mystic Moon tradition," I replied. "We could do his face up in make up like a woman's or braid his hair and tie it to his headboard."

"That's so childish," Celena said. "Now come on, leave him alone. Allen's been through enough."

"Yeah, you're right. Besides, we'd better turn in; Gaddes should have the Crusade ready to go in the morning so we'd better get ready to leave too."

"I'll be honest, I'm more than a little concerned abot the up coming journey. And really nervous about what lies at the end of it."

"Try not to think about it to much," I said. "Just take it one day at a time."

Heaven knew, that was all I could think of to do.

End chapter 8.

Sorry it took so long to get this out. I had written only half of it before going on to write the rest of the story and even though I knew basically what would happen I hadn't bothered to actually write it. And plus I started classes this semester and still had work so I was too busy to write it up and send it out. I want to give a huge thanks to the people who've stuck with the story and reveiwed and the new reviewers as well. The next chapter should be out shortly.

Nightheart.


	9. Chapter 9

"This brings back memories," I said nostalgicly as I gazed out the huge windows at the helm of the levi-ship.

"It does indeed," Allen agreed. "Hitomi, are you certain you don't want to drop by Fanelia City? it would only be a short detour."

"I'd love to be able to, but I must tell you that Celena is in a bit of a bad way. The presence of Dilandau is fighting me off easier each time a re-cast that sheild over her and I'm the rawest of beginners with only the barest of notions of what I'm doing in the first place. The sooner we reach Ubdo, the better. There will be plenty of time for a visit with Van after I attend to this."

"I appreciate your sacrifice on my and my sister's behalf," Allen said. He looked like he would have gotten down on one knee to do that hand kissing thing he does sometimes but I stalled him with a shrug and a dismissive wave.

"What are friends for?" I asked. "Besides, I would have made this Holy Spring of their my next stop anyway; I do have to hunt down those Source Elementals and they should have at least part of the responsibility for cleaning up thier own mess."

"Are you sure about this quest?" Allen asked. "It seems like something very dangerous for you to undertake."

"Dangerous or not I still have to do it. Gaea needs me. I'm just worried about my family; what will they think when after the time I'm supposed to show up back home after my vacation I don't show up? They'll think something bad happened to me, like I might have gotten kidnapped or even killed. It worries me a lot. I'd feel a lot easier about taking all of this on if they knew I was somewhat safe or at least alive and unharmed."

"I would help you if I could but-"

Suddenly my cell phone started chiming its usual notes. Someone was calling my cell? How in the world could that be! As far as I knew no-one on Gaea had anything like a cell phone and even if they did how would they know my number? For that matter, how was it even able to work on this world, there was no satelite to bounce the signal off. The roaming charges must be astronomical. Shaking my head at the mystery I resolved not to look at it anymore closely than I had to and flipped open my phone.

"mosi moshi," I said.

"Hitomi?" my mothers voice said over the phone. "Where on Earth are you!"

"Funny you should say that mama," I said. "I'm not exactly on Earth."

SHe paused for a moment as if she wasn't certain she'd heard me correctly.

"I'm back on that world I told you about," I said before she could say anything else. "I know it sounds crazy but I'm not making it up! AMano and Yukari are with me too."

"I see," she said dubiously.

She'd had dreams about me and Gaea the last time I had disappeared. At first she'd thought that they were just her minds way of trying to reassure her that her only daughter was okay but when I had come back and described the places and the people she'd seen in her dreams so exactly she'd been willing to entertain the notion that maybe there was something deeper going on.

"You you're back with that young man, the one with the wings?" my mother asked. I had always rather gotten the feeling that she'd kind of liked Van. He was probably what she would call "such a nice young man."

"Actually I'm journeying with Allen right now," I said, wincing a little.

"The older man?" I could tell by my mother's tone that she wasn't happy with that notion.

"His sister Celena is sick," I replied, sidestepping the issue. "We're all taking her to some Holy Spring in Fanelia to get better."

"That had better be the only reason he's with you," mom said darkly.

"Oh mom don't worry," I reassured her. "Allen's perfectly fine, he treats me like his younger sister."

"See that it remains that way," she said commandingly. "I won't have my only daughter caught in the web of some philanderer."

"Mother, he's not a philanderer," I defended. "Everybody just paints him that way because he looks the way he does."

"Are you two discussing me?" Allen wondered.

I waved him off, signalling that he wasn't part of our conversation.

"May I remind you young woman that he, a twenty-one year old, proposed marriage to my _fifteen_ year old daughter? And you tell me not to worry?"

"We went through this before mom," I said with aggrieved patience. "It's just how they do things on this world."

"I don't care how they do things on that world missy, he has no business doing them with you. Now I want you away from that man and on the six o-clock pillar of light home young woman!"

"I understand your feelings on the matter mother," I said calmly. "But I can't just wish myself home right now. I have too many things that I have to do yet. First I have to get Celena to the Holy Spring and then I have to meet with the Draconians about a quest I need to go on."

"Quest? What quest! Oh no missy you are not going on any quest! You're coming straight home is what you're doing, and no arguments."

"I already promised Queen Varie I would," I said.

"I'm sure she'll understand," my mother said firmly.

"But mom-!" I protested.

"No buts," my mother said shortly. It was amazing how one conversation from my mother could transform me from self assured young woman about to go on a life-threatening quest for the good of the planet right back to a whiney teenager begging to stay out an extra hour past curfew. Parents.

"Mom, you know I love you and dad and even my little bratty brother every now and again," I said. "I'd love to be able to come back home to my nice peaceful life and start college like all of this didn't exist... but I can't."

"Can't?" she said incredulously. "Are you arguing back with me young woman?"

"I don't have much of a choice," I said, a little helplessly. "It seems I'm the only one for the job and if I don't do this Varie said the world could end. So I'm stuck for it."

"Absolutely not," my mother said unequivocally. "I will not have my daughter traipsing about the wilds of Gaea with some older man on some wild goose chase that could put her in danger. You are coming home right now!"

I winced, and straightened. I had been conditioned from a very young age to obey my mother immediately when she used That Tone. Ahg... I could just see the look on her face. She was not happy with me right now. But underneath that commanding I-am-your-mother-and-you-will-do-as-I-tell-you-to tone I could hear the underlying notes of fear and worry. She didn't want me to get hurt and that was certainly a possiblity on this world, that was the reason for the tone. I knew that, but that knowledge did not make my reaction any less instinctive. I was still inclined to obey the command, unfortunately I wasn't in a position to. That meant I'd have to hold my ground whether I wanted to or not.

"Mom, I can't come home," I said. "Not right now and probably not for a while."

I wasn't certain what to expect; I'd never defied my parents in any way before, I'd always been the good child who got good grades in school and never went out late or gave them anything to worry about (my little brother had more than made up for my exemplary behavior in recent years however). I wasn't sure if my mother was going to explode with indignation or scream at me over the phone or what. I braced myself for impact.

"Okay," she said calmly.

I blinked in surprise.

"Okay?" I asked. "You're not mad?"

"You're old enough now to start making your own decisions Hitomi," my mother said. "This is obviously something you feel you need to do and thus far you've shown good judgement and good sense. In a lot of ways you've had your father and I on the bench for years now, I believe in your good sense."

I was awed and touched by my mother's open declaration of faith in me; it was a big moment when your parent said she was cutting you loose to fledge on your own. My eyes teared up.

"Mama..." I said, unable to go on or think of anything to say.

"Remember Hitomi, if you should need me for anything I'm only a thought away."

And with that she hung up. Her voice had been shaking there at the end, so she was feeling just as emotional as I was at the moment but mom doesn't like others to see her cry. That was fine. I took a deep breath and said

"Well that's one worry out of the way," I said as cheerfully as I could manage. "I'm going to miss my family while I'm here. I always feel so safe with them."

It occured to me that I probably wasn't going to feel safe for a while. Last time I'd come to Gaea I hadn't had a choice on not being able to leave, now that I knew that one could create a pillar of light by combining the power of an energist and the pendant I sort of did have a choice about being able to go home but I'd given my word that I stay until the matter of Gaea and its meridians had been set right. I sighed a little, I didn't know where I was going or how long the quest was going to take or what I might be needed for afterwards for all I knew I might be here for months maybe even years! That thought was not a comfortable one for me. If I was here for years then that would seriously set back the timetable I had made for my college and future career. What if I got so old I couldn't go back?

I shook my head in order to avoid that uncomfortable thought. Surely it wouldn't take that long. If I could go to Atlantis and back in the course of a week or two, then surely, surely it wouldn't take very long at all to gather and seal away those Source Elementals that had escaped the Draconian Seals. I was just going to have to get through it this time like I'd got through it last time... just take it one day at a time. I snorted a little, remembering my near-constant state of anxiety that I'd existed in the last time I'd come here. One day at a time? Yeah. Right.

"This is as far as the Crusade can take us boss," I overheard gaddess tell Allen. "We're on the southern border of Fanelia which is technically a no-fly zone anyway. Our instruments are starting to run into some interference and it'll only get worse if we try to press on."

"Thank-you Gadess," Allen said. "Make sure the old girl makes it back to port safely, we'll go over land from here."

Gaddess brought the Crusade down for a landing in a cleared glen in the forest floor and Yukari, Celena, Allen and I all piled into Amano's SUV which had been retrofitted with the kind of engine they used there on Gaea to run thier machines. The back part of the vehicle was packed with all of the gear we'd brought with us plus food and whatever Allen and Celena had packed to bring.

There wasn't much of a "road" through the land that the Draconians had claimed for their enclave, it was more like a muddy dirt path through the forest. It was a pretty forest anyway, the trees were tall and healthy and many of them were exceptionally old-looking. The canopy overtop was like a sparkling emerald, lush and vital with the leaves swaying slightly in the wind. It felt right here somehow. I wasn't certain why but I felt an immediate sense of comfort steal over me.

"How much time are we making?" Yukari called up to the front.

"About fifty miles per hour," Amano called back. "I'm going slow because I don't want to make any unfortunate mistakes."

"He calls that slow?" Celena said. The she suddenly went into another of her fits, the kind where she was trying to fight Dilandau off for dominance of her body.

:The change shouldn't be taking her like this: Folken said worriedly, popping out from nowhere. I tried not to show my startlement at his sudden appearance.

"That Dilandau is a persistent little S.O.B," I replied dryly as we bounced around a little when Amano hit a rough patch. It was hard to concentrate when I was being jostled like that, the little vaccuum bubble was a difficult thing to manifest without peace and quiet to do it in.

"I'll kill you!" Dilandau's voice screamed from poor Celena's body. "I'll kill you all!"

"And probably enjoy it too, you little psychopath," I muttered giving a particularly violent twist and yank to my powers as my temper showed. The bubble solidified instantly between my hands and I wasted to time in trapping him within it.

"There," I said, looking Celena's aura over very carefully for traces of Dilandau. "That should hold him, at least for a little while."

"These fits are getting more and more frequent," Allen said, worry evident in his voice and expression.

"Yes," I said. "I hope we'll be there soon. For now we'll just have to handle it as best we can."

I didn't want to worry Allen even more with my own problems, so I didn't tell him that locking Dilandau away with my powers was taking its toll on me. Every expenditure of my psychic abilities was also an expenditure of energy for me. I was starting to feel like I'd been jogging for the past half hour and had only just been allowed a break. Fortunately, being an athelete, I knew all the best shortcuts to restoring my energy supply. I grabbed a bottle of gatorade a banana and some wheat thins and proceeded to dig in until I felt better. At one point, the constant blackouts and depleted enegy resources from the visions that sometimes plagued me after I'd gotten home had caused me to be mis-diagnosed with diabetes. Fair enough i suppose; the visions drained me of energy quickly and all at once thus depleting my blood sugar suddenly. Nowdays I kept candy on me just in case I should get hit by a vision, it was a little bit like being diabetic.

"Should we stop and put up camp before the sun sets?" Amano asked. "Pitching a tent in the dark is a little difficult."

"Yeah, I'll point us out a good spot," I volunteered, closing my eyes to start dowsing.

"Don't waste your energy," Yukari said. "The rest of us have perfectly good eyes Hitomi. Save your powers for when we really need them."

"Good idea," I said, a little chagrined. Yukari was right, I should be storing up my strength for emergency use only. We rode along in silnce for a bit when Yukari suddenly started.

"Hey, Amano, slow down and back up a bit," she said. Her boyfriend obeyed and we peered closely out the window. There was a clear spot by a river that looked like it would make a particularly nice little place to camp at. Amano backed the SUV up and we started unloading our gear.

It was a mess at first; too many cheifs and not enough indians as well as the fact that neither me, Celena or Yukari had ever actually been camping before and Allen didn't know how to pitch a dome tent from our world but was too proud to ask for help (and couldn't read the instructions which were written in the language of the Mystic Moon). Amano and Allen would pick this time to argue about where the best place to put the tents as opposed to the cookfire with along and argumentative list of reasons as to why thier placement was the better of the two and who should get the duty of finding firewood and who should do this or that. Eventually we all sorted ourselves out however; Amano and Yukari pitched the two dome tents we had broguht with us, Allen went to get firewood and dig a firepit away from the sleeping area, and me and Celena bungeed up the rain guard in the trees over the tents and then went on the set up the eating pavilion and picinic table.

We settled in over a nice meal of baked potatoes, canned soup and sandwiches and roasted marshmallows. We opened up a case of sake that Amano had smuggled out from his father's supply and started telling exaggerated tales about stupid things that the other people around the campfire had done at one point or another. It was a fun time because everyone was feeling relaxed and in a good humor so we all took the goodnatured teasing in good part because we knew it wasn't meant to be hurtful. There, now this is what a vacation should be, friends getting together laughing and sharing jokes around a campfire.

The next day we were traveling overland again. Folken, hovering in spirit form next to me said that we wouldn't arrive at the Enclave for at least another two days. The ride was kind of boring so I had plugged in my laptop and was playing my favorite strategy game but it was a little boring with just me playing.

Amano was driving which left Allen or Yukari.

"Hey Yukari," I called up to her. "Want to play Kingdoms? I could hook your platform up to mine."

"Sure," she said, crawling back to set up her own laptop.

:What are you two doing: Folken asked curiously as he watched us set up and log in to our two player mode.

:Playing Kingdoms: I answered silently.

I had a game on with Yukari that was going rather well, sometimes on the weekends me her and Amano would all gather together and play a three person world for a few hours. Amano liked to build up his armies and go out and conquer; I was more of a diplomacy and trade kind of player so I relied mainly on my own small armies, my wealth and good standing with the mecenary guild, the odd terrain of my country, and the Alliance I had with my more war-like neighboring countries.

The game Yukari and I were playing had me on the opposite side of the river, my side was more fertile but her side had most of the ores to make armor. She had built herself a large and powerful army while I'd been busy making a lot of money.

GREETINGS QUEEN HITOMI, YOU HAVE MADE YOURSELF INTO A FAT GOLDEN GOOSE AND NOW I SHALL TAKE YOU TO MARKET. Yukari I.M.'ed me. It was her way of saying that now that I had my gold stocks and graneries as filled as she wanted them she needed to invade my little country in order to feed her armies.

But of course I had known she was going to do this and so was ready for her. The nice thing about the game of Kingdoms was that it relied not soley on how much in the way of defenses you could raise or how big an army you could feild but if your kingdom was wealthy enough to afford it you could employ the services of spies and assassins as well as hire armies from the mercenary guild. I had a veritable army of spies and assassins; it had severly depleted my treasury but... well, they were worth it.

CAN'T WE ALL JUST GET ALONG? I IM'ed in reply.

NO! Yuakri replied. YOU DON'T WIN KINGDOMS BY PUSSYFOOTING AROUND.

QUEEN YUKARI, SINCE YOU'RE MY FRIEND I'M GOING TO WARN YOU; BACK OFF BEFORE I TAKE YOU TO MARKET! I IM'ed her back. from her position behind her screen Yukari looked skeptical. Well, according to my agents she was receiving tribute from about four other countries on the map in order to support her massive army. I couldn't really blame her for thinking that my tiny little country couldn't possibly put up much of a fight.

The thing about conquering other countries in order to feed ones own army was that the conquering nation tended to lean heavily upon the conquered ones, demanding tribute for their coffers and conscripts for their armies as well as food for supplies and such. This built up a lot of resentment. Yukari usually counteracted the bad popularity this brought by holding regular festivals and games for her people but it only took a little bit to tip the balance off again.

I set half of my spies to bringing down her popularity level in the foreign lands that she occupied thus causing riots and dissention. and most of the rest I had gathering information on her next move.

Next to me, Folken was chuckling and looking very amused.

:What: I asked him sitting back to enjoy the fruits of my orders.

:It's just that you look so sweet and gentle and yet you use such dirty tactics.: he said sounding highly amused.

:Hey: I said. :This is not dirty tactics, I'm just more in the way of a diplomat not a fighter. This saves my own people from having thier homes beseiged and besides, Yukari shouldn't go around conquering other nations anyway; it's rude.:

:I didn't say I disapproved: Folken replied. :If I might make a suggestion however; you're not utilizing all of your bought strength to full capacity. If I'm reading the game correctly it says that you have bought four companies of skirmishers from the Mercenary guild but that they stand idle in thier camps just outside your main city.:

:Yeah, I bought them to off-set my horse archers but in the open terrain around the city I'd be sending them into a suicide run if I sent them out to fight. They do best in rough terrain you see, so I don't have much of a use for them.:

:Well, you might assign your Specialist Mercenary troops to interrupt her supply lines: Folken suggested. :It is a saying in Fanelia that an army marches on its stomach; if she can't feed her troops they'll start deserting, especially the conscripts. Sowing enough dissention might just topple her army. At the very least it will buy you time.:

:That's a great idea: I said, amazed. There was a function for that too, now that I thought about it. It was listed in the spy register under Tactics.

:You could also do well to send assassins to kill off the governers of her outposts in the kingdoms she is occupying now and send some anonymous gold coins to your spy units to fund the rebellions that are sure to spring up.:

:Good idea: I said. :Wow, you're really clever at this game.:

:I should be: he replied. :I used to do it in real life, when I lived that is.:

Yukari lost quite a lot of supplies and troops due to my tactics as I steadily grew more and more wealthy. Bribes to neighboring countries to put economic sanctions on Yukari didn't go amis either. Unfortunately...

Unfortunately despite all that she had lost, her amies still outnumbered mine and she still had the resources to create more weapons and armor than I did so she got the brilliant idea to put a blockade up around me and starve me and my people out. SHe also got some of her soldiers to do alittle raiding and some burning of the feilds. Kingdoms was a game very much hailed for it's accuracy as it was for its complexity.

Bugger, I thought watching my crops burn as my cheif of Graneries told me that we only had enough food stored away to last another eight months. I had high walls around my main city, located in a pocket Valley just outside of the fertile farmland. There were archers enough manning the walls and watchtowers to hold off an army, but not enough to defeat one.

I went to my spy list to see if they had any new information I might be able to use and it said she was planning something but they weren't certain what. Likewise my assassins couldn't get close enough to her to remove the source of my threat for good, and besides logistics told me that if I tried the army would slinter into raiding parties that would make nuisances of themselves.

So how to get around a blockade from an army that was well enough equipped and entrenched to outlast my ability to keep my people fed? She was far enough away to wher the army I had manning the walls wouldn't be able to rain down on her with arrows and whittle away at her forces, and yet she had placed her forces near enough to keep any supplies or aid from reaching the inside of my Kingdom. Unfortunately, Kingdoms was placed well before the days of the air drop.

I tried turning to my allies for help, but they sent thier regrets in reply (probably because they felt that as long as Queen Yukari was placing all of her energy on conquering my country then she wasn't spending any time on conquering theirs). Naturally I had some of my spies set up as blockade runners but unfortunately in the game of war, information was more valuable than food or even weapons. Morale in my city was low because of the half-rations. If my popularity continued to

\

decline steadily then there would be riots and strife within and Yukari would win for certain.

:A difficult situation: Folken said. :It rather reminds me of the hostile take-over I once led against the city-state of Torushina. I had set up a blockade much the same as this one with enough floating fortresses in the sky to cut off all attempts at air-dropping supplies and enough troops on the ground to completely cut off comunications and trade.:

:SO what happened: I asked curiously.

:They surrendered: Folken replied.

:Great. That's not very useful you know. I was hoping you'd give me some nice timely advice on how to break this blockade around me.:

:She has placed her peices well: Folken said. :You could try looking for a weakness.:

I went back to studying the positioning of her forces. Folken had that elder-brother-playing-teacher tone to his voice so it sounded a bit like he was testing me. It was my game after all and it wouldn't be as fun if he played it for me. I studied the map hard for a while, like a chessplayer looking over a board. She had placed all of her forces in exactly the places they needed to be, yes she had chosen her ground well. I couldn't see how her army had any weaknesses.

The forces she had were all spaced evenly... but then I noticed something when I went back and re-read what my spies had sent me about her forces.

:They're all the same: I exclaimed in epiphany.

Yukari had only feilded one kind of force instead of having a few of the wide variety of forces available. She had either brought mounted knights or plaing knights; there were no archers, no pikemen no skirmishers... none of the so-called "lesser forces." It made sense because armored knights whether mounted or unmounted had a serious advantage when it came to defense, arrows had almost no effect on them. She'd chosed her forces based on the knowledge that most of the defenses around my city would be archers and that if I were foolish enough to meet her out on the open feild surrounding my kingdom then she would still have the advantage because knights were only useful in pitched battles. The resources in Yukari's kingdom enabled her to feild an army full of "invincable knights" so she saw no reason to pay gold for skirmishers or lesser fighters when she could have all of the heavy cavalry she wanted.

Back in World War 2, I recalled from my father's copious obsession with histical battles. Hitler and Stalin waged a street war in the streets of Stalingrad. Hitler had the better equipped army and a way of getting supplies to his troops via support laid in by two of his allies. What did Stalin do? Aside of order his people not to take a step back... What did he do? Oh, yes... I think he attacked both flanks pushing then toward the middle and into the city and then picked them off one by one. It was something like that anyway. 

:If I let her inside the city walls her army of knights would have a hard time moving around inside. The unmounted knights are a lot slower than pikemen and skirmishers who have less armor to weigh them down. If my people can hit them with strike and run tactics we'd be able to weedle thier forces thin enough to have a chance of attacking. However, if I let that army within my cities walls they would be able to kill my civilians and burn my city down.:

:You could evacuate all non-essential personel to your keep: Folken replied, sounding satisfied that I had come up with a solution. :And arm the rest of the civilians as best you can. Have them set up blind alleys and such.:

"I don't think there's a function for that in this game.: I said. :But skirmishing within the city will give me the advantage anyway, unless of couse she starts burning things.:

It was another hour or so of play when the game finally concluded in a draw. I'd learned more about Folken in the process of it; he was as clever and crafty as ten generals.

We were stopped again for the night; setting up camp had gone a little easier this time around with everyone knowing what to do. We'd made good time alon the southern border of Fanelia and Folken said that we should reach the Draconian Enclave at the Ubdo Holy Springs by late afternoon tomorrow.

Celena was doing well enough as could be expected given the fact that Dilandau wouldn't shut the hell up. Even I could hear him... well, sort of anyway. It wasn't exactly hearing with my ears, but it was undeniably a sense. I could feel his aggression, his anger at being trapped inside his weaker counterpart's body, his hatred of the world in general and dislike of me in personal. It was like the heat of the sun at midday on an incredibly hot day when you don't have any water and no way to keep cool; it was relentless and very very distracting. I tried to concentrate on other things to keep my mind off sensing him but it was just always there!

I wish I had a way to block him out, I thought, not for the first time. While I had lived on Earth after my visit to Gaea my powers had grown and changed as much as I had. Unfortunately my knowledge of how to control them hadn't grown any. I was still the rawest of beginners. On Earth i had simply adapted my life around my weird abilities; I had avoided the morning crush at the train station by leaving early so that I wouldn't crammed up against people and have to be subjected to sensing their emotions and visions of all of thier petty little problems as well. To the best of my abilities I had simply ignored my powers and gotten on with my normal life.

I turned to the most practiced and reliable of all of my powers, dowsing. I wasn't doing this for any altruistic reason I'm ashamed to say, but just that I had been traveling for two days straight and hadn't had a decent bath yet. Those Holy Springs might be some kind of hot spring and if I was lucky there might be more in the area.

C'mon, c'mon hot springs! I begged. Tonight was going to be an important night and we girls needed a place to bathe.

"Jackpot!" I cried triumphantly. There was a hot spring nearby! I led Yukari and Celena over to it and told them that I'd be along in a few minutes with our clothes and bathing things.

Once I was alone with the two guys we dropped the casual act we'd been holding for the last few minutes and got down to serious plotting. Amano was pacing back and forth near the fire, wringing his hands nervously and practicing what he wanted to say under his breath.

"Is everything ready?" I asked of Amano and Allen.

"It's all in place," Allen said. "I don't see why you want to set a table that close to a lake in the middle of no-where, why not just eat here at camp?"

"That lake happens to be a very lucky place to pop the question," I replied, riffling through my gear for the dress I'd picked out for my best friend's proposal. "We want this night to be something they'll remember for the rest of their lives."

"You're sure she doesn't suspect anyhing?" Amano asked, pacing nervously. He was dressed in his best silk shirt, vest and slacks with his lucky silk tie around his neck.

"She doesn't have a clue," I reassured him.

"Do I look okay?" Amano asked, looking down at himself. I paused to look at him appraisingly in the firelight for a moment. He looked good, but there seemed to be something missing...

"Come here," I said. "Your hair's a mess." I got a comb from my bathing things, wetted it and combed his hair back, securing it with a plain eleastic band. Men did not wear srunchies.

"There," I said, pleased. "You look handsome. Do you have the ring?"

Amano pulled a black velvet box out of his pocket.

"Hitomi... thanks for everything," he said sincerely. "I know that without you I wouldn't be able to do this tonight, not just because you helped me plan this but also because you'ved helped keep us together. I know there have been times when Yukari and I have fought over stupid little stuff, and you've always been there to help us see that sometimes the stupid little stuff make us stronger."

"What are best friends for?" I replied. "Now go, we girls have bathing to do and you boys have food to prepare."

Yukari, Celena and I went off for a nice soak in private with an admonition to the boys (espesially Amano) that we were not to be disturbed. Celena was shocked when Yukari and I proceeded to strip down to nothing in order to climb in. We exchanged a glance, perhaps it was a cultural thing. The two of us seized a protesting young woman by either arm and proceeded to drag her to the spring with is, eliminating those silly skirts and corsets and underskirts and under-under skirts she insisted upon wearing as we went.

"Ahhhhhh," I sighed in pure bliss as I sank down up to my neck in hot, steaming sulphorous water. My muscles loosened up and I felt completely relaxed. As my body relaxed, so did another part of me; that part being the ever-present tension in my head that kept my powers on a leash. That aura sight of mine kicked in and this time I was surprised to see a marked change in Celena's own aura. No reds and blacks fighting for dominance with her peaceful blues and lavenders, just a simple calm cerulean blue. Well that's good. Yukari's playful purples and mischievous oranges flashed over a more cheerfully peaceful lime-green.

In addition to the auras of my friends glowing in the night air i could also see vague shapes in the air and in the water. At first I was detirmined that I was hallucinating; the water rippled in vague sugestions of faces and forms of tiny humanoid bodies that were clear and glowing blue in my Sight. At first I thought the softly glowing lights that faded in and out of the air were nothing more than this world's version of fireflies until I asked about them and no-one else seemed to be able to see them. Stranger and stranger my powers grew. I shrugged, perhaps all of Varies talk about elementals wasn't so far-fetched after all.

We began a three-way water war between us, splashing and laughing as Yukari and I weren't allowed to when we visited the hot springs resorts in Japan. Bathing was serious business there.

Amano was going to ask Yukari tonight. He had come to me earlier to help him with the last-minute preparations. He was very nervous, I'd been able to calm him a little but it was only natural that he'd be feeling jittery about such an important thing. I had agreed to help distract her and keep her occupied for long enough for him to prepare. In fact, it had been no accident that we'd stopped here. The time was just about right...

I looked over to the east and the thin line of mountains in the distance, the moons were almost above the rim of them.

"Yukari," I said. "We should get out before we start getting all pruney and look like old women."

"You're right," Celena said quickly. "Besides, I'm sure Amano and Allen will start getting worried about us if we're out in the woods too long."

We stood up to towel off. Celena and I were watching Yukari, trying not to look eagre and impatient. We had been keyed up about this for most of the evening. I'd switched out Yukari's plain clothes.

"Hitomi?" Yukari said, sounding puzzeled. "I could have sworn I asked you to grab my shorts and a t-shirt for camping after the soak but I can't find them."

"You can't?" I said, trying to sound puzzled while not trying to give myself away by laughing in glee.

"No, I see Celena's clothes... no mistakking those, and I see one of your outfits but I can't find my own clothes."

"Oops, I must have accidentally grabbed something else instead," I lied. It hadn't been an accident.

"The only other thing I see here is a white satin night gown," she said. "Or it looks like a night gown anyway."

I'd picked it up in Freid for her for just this occasion. A best friend always watches out for her best friends interests. I was certain that that they'd both remember how she looked just like a princess in a romantic tale this evening. And it wasn't a nightgown! The shoulders were pinned together, grecian-style, by silver clasps and folded gracefully across the front in loose folds to the waist. The waist was belted by one of those belts that had the long cord-thing hanging down the front like a Y-necklace and the many misty layers of silk of the skirt fell with equal grace to her feet. Elegent simplicity.

It still does look a little like a nightgown, I had to admit to myself but I was certain once she had it on it would look like a dress.

"Why did you grab this?" Yukari demanded in puzzelment. "It's much too pretty to bring out during a camping trip. It could get dirty."

"I guess you'll just have to wear it back to camp and change there," I said.

"Are you and Celena coming?" Yukari asked, turning to look over at where we lingered, toweling off and playing with our short wet hair. We both looked down and away, pretending to be very interested in the lacings of our shoes or something; mainly we were hiding our faces so we wouldn't give anything away.

"No, that's okay. You go on ahead," I said. "We'll catch up."

Amano was waiting by the lake with a chilled bucket of wine a table spread with a white linen table cloth (salvaged from Allen's house) and lit by candles. I had picked the location for him; this lake was the same place that Van's parents had proposed... it had to be good luck!

"Yeah," Celena seconded. "We'll be along in a minute."

Yukari looked suspicious. Celena and I were trying very hard to keep our faces straight and our voices from betraying anythig but she had to have sensed that something was up.

"I don't know the way back to camp," she said.

"There's a big lake with fireflies a little ways through the trees that way," I said, pointing. "You can just barely see it from here. You just follow around the shoreline for a little bit and it'll lead you right where you need to go."

Celena and I, unable to resist, waited until we were sure Yukari was well on her way to the prearranged meeting place and then quietly followed to witness the moment.

"So romantic," Celena sighed quietly as we watched Yukari "come across" the special spot, just as she'd been meant to.

The table had been spread with a white cloth and had two long tapered candles in the middle of it, the light from which reflected off the still waters of the lake. Amano waited there, nervously, in his best day-suit and pulled the chair out for her, standing beside it.

At first she looked puzzeled but then we watched as she suddenly got a catch in her breath and a look of suppressed hope on her face. Dinner was a short stilted affair in which both parties tried to find something light an innocuous to talk about. Then, towards the end of it, Amano began the speech he'd been practicing in secret for the last few weeks. He managed not to stammer through it in his nervousness.

By the time he got down on one knee all of us were crying. It was beautiful!

And she said yes.

Not a bad chapter, but not one of my favorites either. Sorry it took so long to post, I've been having troubles with my internet. I want to give a huge shout out to Corran Nakatori for his/her (no gender given) continuous reviews, it's much appreciated. Also to Avelyn Lauren for all of her reviews as well.


	10. Chapter 10

Having witnessed the beautiful marriage proposal between my two best friends I returned to camp and my sleeping roll bursting with happiness for the two of them. I truly wished them joy and a long happy life together. But to be honest, part of me was a little sad too. The proposal had also served to remind me that we were all moving on with our lives, time seemed to be passing so quickly. It was making me feel whistful and nostalgic.

We'll all be going our own separate ways soon, I thought.

Yukari and Amano would get married and then they'd go to England together so that he could attend Oxford. It left me feeling a little lonely to tell the truth; it seemed like they had everything going for them and I, who had already mapped out my future on Earth before I'd gotten plucked up like a weed from my native soil, wasn't certain where I was going anymore. It just seemed like the world kept getting in my way. All of these different and strange things that I had never planned for kept happening to me.

My father used to quote John Lennon at me; "life is what happens while you're busy making other plans" I thought dryly.

Tomorrow would bring me to the Draconian Enclave. There I would step past the point of no return. As long as I remained untrained and untutored in my strange abilities, there was still the possibility that I could just turn right around and run back to my safe little home on Earth. This wasn't my world and wasn't my problem and I certainly didn't have to get involved... I could still decide that chasing Source Elementals wasn't for me.

I was scared. As scared as ever I had been during the war here on Gaea. I could get hurt, perhaps even killed by one of those rogue elementals. Tonight was the night I would truly decide, once and for all; turn back or go forward.

Turn back and go home to my world, home where it was safe and I had a secure and pleasant future awaiting me... Or go forward, go forward and face the unknown future on a strange world with impossible dangers and unforetold powers lying before me. One path was relatively safe, predictable, and comforting in its familiarity. The other path was fraught with danger and the fear that uncertainty inevitably brings with it.

_But it may be worth it_. A tiny still, quiet voice from deep within me spoke insistently. A still, subtle voice that speaks from something greater, outside of ourselves. Perhaps the voice of the universe. Could it be?

Listen to your heart.

My grandmother had always said that the only thing to do when faced with a choice like this was to listen to your heart. I had learned however that the heart was a strange thing, easily swayed sometimes, easily fooled. Still... I closed my eyes and sat there silently, bathed in the moonlight, trying to listen.

The ephemeral moon-mist cord that connected my heart to Van's suddenly flared up with startling brilliancy before my inner Sight. I was all but flung out of my body and in the blink of an eye found myself floating next to Van. He was sitting on the rooftop of a building looking up at the two moons glowing brightly in the sky.

What was it with this guy and rooftops?

He was brooding. Not thinking hard about something, but brooding. He was wearing his "sullen king" expression. I could feel that agitated turmoil in his heart without even needing to open my senses. My senses were always open to him.

"What's wrong, Van?" I asked. He made a surprised noise as he started halfway to his feet. He looked around, but apparently couldn't see my form in astral projection.

"Hitomi?" he whispered, sounding half afraid.

"I'm here," I replied. "You're upset about something, what's wrong Van?"

"I go to face my first combat tomorrow," he said. "If I loose I must relinquish my claim on the throne of Fanelia to the victor."

"This is a law in Fanelia?" I questioned.

"Yes," he replied.

"And the fact that you must fight in mortal sword combat still bothers you as much as it did when Balgus was training you?" I hazarded, trying to figure out what precisely had him so out of sorts.

"It's not the fact that I must fight," He said after a small shake of his head. "All kings of Fanelia must. It is the fact that my noblemen have measured me in their eyes and found me wanting. I love Fanelia and the thought that I am considered inadequate to the throne..." he trailed off, not wanting to finish. I could feel the rest anyway. He was hurt by it.

"Van. That's impossible," I said firmly. "You have acted with greater courage, strength, wisdom and heart than any ten of those silly noblemen put together. Time and time again you've been tested and you've risen to meet that test."

"I had help," he replied as if it were a failing. "You had to follow me into death to reawaken me. Surely that is a weakness."

"Since when is it a weakness to let someone who cares about you help you?" I replied. "A rock cannot stand against the wind and rain for long before it is whittled away to nothing. So too with people; we all need each other at one time or another, we are meant to need each other."

"I don't want to rely on you," he said. "It causes you suffering."

"Relying on my powers causes me suffering," I corrected him gently. "Relying on _me_ gives me strength."

"Gives you strength?" he said, sounding confused.

"Who do you think it is that reminds me of my own courage?" I said by way of answer. "The bravest person I know is a man who once fell into a haze of fear and anger after a battle and couldn't stop shaking, and yet who forced himself to come to terms with his deeds, forgive himself, forgive his enemies, and find the strength to fight again."

"It was your compassion that helped me find it," he replied.

"And your courage that gave me the strength to help," I replied to that. "I believe in you Van. No matter what, I believe in you."

"Hitomi," he said. "What if your faith is misplaced? What if I'm really _not_ good enough?"

Oddly enough it was a question I wondered about myself often. I felt I was strange, that I wasn't acceptable somehow, that there was something out-of-place about me. I'd read that women in general have feelings of inadequacy frequently throughout their lives (that had probably been written by a man). Maybe people in general questioned themselves.

"Then I know you'll only work harder to make yourself good enough," I replied, finding the answer to both his and my own questions in a piece of wisdom oft repeated to me by my grandmother. "I believe in you even when you can't believe in yourself because I know you won't ever truly give up on yourself. You're at your best when things are at their worst, you are stongest when others around you are weakened, you shine the noblest when all around you is dross. It's because you're the right one for it. No-one could love Fanelia as much as you do, or fight as hard for it. Its already proven and will be again. You face what you most fear and overcome it because... because you love your kingdom."

"There is another thing too that I love," he said wistfully. "But unfortunately it is far away from me and so we will not speak of it at this time."

"I am always with you Van," I replied, not telling him that I was actually closer than he thought. It would only distract him and he needed all of his concentration for the fight ahead.

"I have the strength of your beliefs," he said. "But there is another thing that bothers me, besides what lies ahead tomorrow."

"What is that?" I asked.

"It's hard to explain. Fanelia has always seemed to have a life, a vitality completely separate from its incredible natural beauty. However lately something seems... off. There's something out of kilter and I cannot see what it is. It's like this nagging feeling that I get, I can feel it deep in my bones. There's something wrong."

"In your blood," I whispered in surprised realization.

"Excuse me?" he queried.

"It's in your blood," I replied cryptically. I wasn't sure entirely how I knew but it was one of those marrow-deep knowings, the ones that were never ever wrong.

"I don't understand, how do you--"

"I'm not sure myself," I said. "But its true and will reveal itself in the fullness of time."

"Nice and cryptic," he said.

"I am not here to give answers, but to lead you in finding your own questions and remind you of yourself when the need arrives."

"Well anyway, I have no choice but to fight tomorrow," he said.

"You always have a choice Van," I reproved.

"Well in this case my choice is fight to win and remain king or do nothing and loose all."

"The death and loss of one thing may only herald change in a new direction," I suggested.

"I like the direction I'm on right now thank-you," he said. "If I must choose then I choose to fight to hold what I love. I don't always like being king, I can recall a time when it was the last thing I wanted to do and there are even days now when I dream yearningly of finding a nice quiet goat-hut in the mountains and living the rest of my days without all of these cares and responsibilities. But I made my choice long ago and will hold to it."

A heavy choice to make, I realized, and not one that you make once but over and over. Everyday he probably had to wake choosing to be king. There are many who will say that being king is something you're either born to or you're not, and in a way that's certainly true, but that's also a bit like the line between destiny and free will. You could be born a prince and groomed to take the throne but in the end you had to choose to hold it, to fight for it, to be the right one for it.

I could be born with strange powers and put into place to save Gaea but in the end I had to choose to use that power. No-one could make that choice but me.

"But Choices have consequences Hitomi," Van said aloud, almost as if he could read my mind, feel my struggle. "Not just for yourself, but for others, and you are responsible for those. You can't help what others choose, but you choose your own fate."

"Our lives, great and small are the result of our actions," I said slowly, like a blind man feeling his way through the dark, reaching for an epiphany. "Actions stem from choices. Choices stem from intent. Intent stems from... the heart?"

Click.

"That's what she meant!" I exclaimed. "I wasn't _pulling_ bad futures into place just by being anxious about it."

"Of course not, that's silly," Van said, sounding utterly mystified as to what I was talking about. I'd never told him of my conversation with his mother. "Everyone gets anxious about the future, me especially. And you're just a natural born worrier."

"Purity of intent," I said.

"The road to hell is paved with good intentions, or so they say," Van said. "Just look at the recent mess we had with Dornkirk, Folken and that stupid fate machine. That's a case in point. They had good intentions but wound up mucking everything up."

"Doing the right thing for the wrong reasons is inherently worse than doing the wrong thing for the right reasons. With one, you're just looking for personal gain but with the other... with the other at least you're trying to improve yourself or trying to make things better. So I can either make the selfish choice and go home or I step off the cliff and hope the air holds me up."

"You've lost me," Van said.

"That's okay I know where I am," I said. I couldn't help but feel a little giddy with relief at having at last found my answer. I leaned over and gave him a light ephemeral kiss on the cheek before I faded back into my body, secure in the knowledge that tomorrow I would go on to face the challenges of the unknown.

"Hold there!" a guard said leveling a spear at our vehicle. He was an ordinary looking young man, but for the two spots above his eyes where his eyebrows started. The spear-tip he held in front of him shone with pinkish glow that seemed somehow menacing. Our conveyance was swiftly surrounded by more guards, all of them with spots above their eyes and glowing spear-tips.

"It looks like we've arrived," Allen said dryly.

"You there, outsiders!" one of the guards said. "Why do you trespass here? Outsiders have no business meddling in among our kind."

"Ah, and reverse racism makes it way to Gaea _too_ I see," Yukari muttered. "C'mon Hitomi let's go, it's obvious we're not welcome here."

:They have good reason to be wary of outsiders: Folken said from where he hovered nearby. "Ubdo is the seat of power for the Draconian Enclaves, as well as holding the purest of the holy springs; if outsiders were to become aware of its potential for use the Draconian people would suffer greatly for it.:

:If you say so: I replied.

The guards demanded that those who sought entry into the Holy Spring Ubdo to meet with High Priest Lagusu exit from their armored vehicle and come with them in person, with no weapons.

As the unfortunate nominal leader in this expedition, I stepped out first. There seemed to be some kind of thickness in the air for a moment as I stepped forward to face them but I shrugged it off easily in order to introduce myself properly.

"I am Hitomi," I said. "I apologize for the intrusion but my friend is... sick, and I need to get training in order to help her. I've heard that you of the Holy Spring of Ubdo can teach me how to wield my abilities."

Suddenly there was a spectral shape of an old man with long grey hair in a pony-tail and a drooping grey mustache hovering in the air directly before us.

"At last you are come!" The old man said. "Bring them to me in the capital directly."

The guards hastened to obey. The rest of my companions climbed out behind me. Allen was told to discard his weapon or stay in the carriage. Unhappy about leaving his sword behind, but resigned to necessity of their rules, he reluctantly stowed it in the backseat and handed his sister out. We were shown through a city of all white marble with patterned cobblestones and elegant pillars. It was almost an exact replica of the ruins in the Mystic Valley!

We were met at the front steps of an enormous white building with stained glass windows depicting scenes of some kind of ritual or something; I could only guess at what the stylized shapes in the glass might represent. The man who had shown up in specter was there in person.

:That's high preist Lagusu: Folken said, fading in beside me. I nearly gasped in surprise.

:Don't _Do_ that: I thought hard at him, nearly clutching my chest from startlement. :You'll give a poor girl a heart-attack:

:My apologies: Folken said then silenced himself as we approached the High Preist and he began to speak.

"I am High Preist Lagusu," the old man said. "This Enclave at the Holy Spring of Ubdo welcomes you, Seer from the Mystic Moon. The training in your powers that you seek will be provided to you here. Your friends I am afraid must guest in one of our guest-houses while you are trained, they do not have our permission to wander freely about the city, but all services they might want will be provided for them in that place. We are wary of outsiders I am afraid."

I exchanged a glance with my friends, asking if it was alright with them. Yukari nodded looking over at Amano; if she could be where he was then she had no real objections to a sort of confinement. Allen looked like he didn't like it, but signaled that he was willing to jump through a few hoops in order to save his sister.

"I thank-you for your understanding and hospitality then High Preist Lagusu," I replied. "I can begin training immediately if you wish."

As far as I was concerned the sooner I got started, the sooner I could finish.

"Good then," he replied. "You may be assured that your friends will be well cared for."

The guards feel into a two columns surrounding our small party, whether that was to lead us to the city of Ubdo or to protect the citizens from us dangerous outsiders was unclear. The bare, beaten animal track we had been traveling along gradually began to widen out into a true road as we pushed through the thick greenery. The bare road led to what looked to be nothing more than an innocuous grey canyon wall, the kind that led to dead ends.

I was shocked when the canyon wall faded right before my eyes, revealing a secret pocket-valley with a beautiful and majestic old city spread out before us. The place was reminiscent of what I had seen of the city of Atlantis; beautiful sculpted white marble on the buildings, streets paved with mosaic tile, lovely gardens to enjoy a beautiful view in. The buildings weren't tall (well, not by my standards anyway) the highest one didn't reach more than three stories. I suppose there was no point in having a secret valley but then giving away the secret by housing enormous architecture. The buildings weren't tall but that didn't mean that they weren't majestic, they were exceedingly beautiful. The Holy Springs had its own character however; there were fountains everywhere! They came in all shapes, sizes and styles; from grand sculptures such as I had seen pictures of decorating the Vatican at Rome, to many tiered waterfalls made to look like natural formations, to faint, dribbling trickles, to calm reflecting pools.

I gave my friends a last reassuring look and followed the old man into the temple.

The floors were of light blue and green-banded marble polished to a glassy finish and arranged in a radial pattern from the center of the temple. The glass-dome ceiling was supported by majestic white marble pillars carved in the shape of angels... or perhaps on this world they were Draconians, with thier wings supporting the ribs of the arches. There fountains at the base of each of the pillars, water running from some sourceless direction and going who only knew where.

In the center of the temple was an enormous circular pool that cast white water-shadows up at the ceiling. In the middle of this circular pool hovered an immense light red crystal; it had an axis of two massive spars pointing straight up and down and out of the middle jutted a ring of smaller spars glittering in the light.

The power radiating out from it was almost enough to knock me flat on my ass. I instictively knew not to turn on my othersight, for it would be like staring full at the sun just as I'm walking out of a dark place. It would surely blind me and hurt while it was doing it.

"This, my dear, is Ougura, our sacred seal. It is one of the seven Source Energists protected and used by our kind since the dawn of Gaea."

"You mean this is the energist you use to commune with the power of Gaea and communicate your will to the Elementals?" I asked, still looking at the pretty crystal with awe. Here it was, pure crystalized power.

Lagusu's bushy eyebrows raised at my knowledge of things but he merely nodded.

"This Seal, along with the six others were made by the original Atlanteans directly after the destructing of thier homeland and the creation of Gaea. They wanted to never again repeat thier terrible mistakes and had decided to withdraw from the world they'd set in motion to live out thier lives in pennence and atonement, helping that world to grow. They used thier pendants, that they had once used as a focus to access the Atlantis Machine to make thier wishes come true, and melded them together. The pendant stones melded together and crystalized into the great crystal you see before you."

"The pendant stones?" I asked. "Like the pendant I used to wear?"

"Yes, did you think yours was the only one?" Lagusu replied.

I didn't. I'd seen the winged Atlanteans holding many of them before the fall in a vision I'd had once.

"Ougura is in bad shape. When I and my brethren tried to use the power of the sacred seal to re-establish the pathways of energy that feed the Elementals we discovered that the war and Dornkirks blasted mucking about with that Zone of Absolute Fortune had vastly complicated things. The Zone of Absolute Fortune was supposed to give everyone their own wishes, which is an inherently greedy thing, so instead of bringing ou the best of mankind it instead amplified the greed, avarice, and occasionally vicious darker side we all have. All of this negative energy was spread out into the meridians, and then into the foci and we could not purify them in time before the crystals, warped by the negative energy, cracked. The pendant stones reverted to their original state, the Seal splintered apart and some of the pendant crystals caught in the blast flew to far-flung corners of the world. The Elementals, which had been starving for energy for months, quickly sought out and merged with these pieces of energist. I and the others, through a great effort of will, managed to call back and seal away many of the Source Elementals but to our saddness there were many that were strong enough to resist us or were too far away for us to reach."

"Yes, I was told that since I have enough power within me, that I must kill the physical bodies they have made for themselves and seal away their astral forms for good. The problem is that I have no idea how I'm supposed to do it. I barely even know how to use my powers let alone use them proactively," I admitted, figuring that honesty would be best.

"I have been expecting you Seer from the Mystic Moon," Lagusu said.

I blinked as it clicked. Surely he couldn't mean...

"It was _you_?" I demanded, shocked. "_You_ brought me here Lagusu?"

"With the right application of power I, High Preist Lagusu of the Holy Springs Dragon Clan, can summon a pillar of light to and from the Mystic Moon," he acknowledged. "Unfortunately, I cannot control precisely where it lands. I need one with the Sight in order to hunt down the Source Elementals and restore balance to Gaea again. You will receive training in your Gifts Hitomi."

I think I've been had, I thought, expecting to feel a little spark of anger at having been so used. Oddly enough there wasn't one, oh well, perhaps it would come later when i had had time to dwell on it a bit.

"I don't have much time to learn how to use my powers," I said. "Celena is getting worse and I still must search out the Source Elementals as soon as possible. Is there any way we could speed up the process, or maybe just have me take a crash course?"

"Ah the young are so very impatient. Learning and knowledge are two slightly different things, knowledge will not aid you where a lesson must be learned," Lagusu said. "However you are right when you say that time is of the essence. Fear not, step into the sacred spring Ubdo child and all will become apparent."

With no small amount of trepidation at getting so near a rogue energist of such power, I gingerly lowed myself into the water below the energist floating in mid-air above the spring. I held my breath and submerged my head and suddenly there was a flash of white light tinged faintly with red. The next thing I knew I found myself in another place entirely; almost like one of my Visions, but not quite. This felt different somehow.

I looked around me, the place I was in couldn't exactly be called a room, it was... words escaped me. It was warm in that strange place that wasn't a place, warm and peaceful. The closest I could come to as far as a description would be to say that it was like what floating in the womb must be like. I didn't know up from down and for a moment I panicked despit the all-pervading peace I was surronded with.

"Fear not child," a sourceless voice said to me, it was like the whisper of a thousand voices in chorus or the sound of the wind sighing through the trees or the waves shushing into the land.

"Who are you?" I asked feeling frightened and out of my depth as I hadn't since the time I'd foreseen the Doppleganger's death in Freid. "Where am I?"

"We are Gaea, a part of Gaea and the distant echoes of the ones who created it," the voices answered. "And you are inside the energist and inside your mind. It takes years to master a truly strong gift for mastery of gift and self are one. The outside world does not have years and neither do you. In here you will learn everything you need to in order to acheive your mastery while no time shall pass in the outside world."

"That's a relief," I said. Before I could go on to thank the whispering voices I was knocked broadside by my first lesson.

"First lesson," the whispers said. "Nothing comes without cost." And then the real teachings began.

It was a bit like an avalanche inside my mind but somehow, instead of being a flood of meaningless pictures and notions my mind somehow expanded beyond anything I had ever dreamed possible to encompass and understand each and every idea that was shown to me. I knew this knowledge... it had always been here!

I didn't know how or why but it all made perfect sense. It was like... it was like I had been born knowing all of this and had somehow forgotten it. That thought caused the voices to whisper to me that everyone was born knowing these things and they that all forgot it. All save the ancient denizens of Atlantis; they had found a way to tap into the collective unconscious of all mankind but they had used the knowledge to further thier own ends, treating it as a possession instead of a gift.

If only there was a way to learn my school textbooks this easily, I thought vaguely. For no sooner did I come across a new idea that in my old life would have left me shaking my head in denial at its possibility, then I fully understood it.

I learned about the energy of the body. It was more than just the mist of aura that people exuded that was colored by their emotions. There was much more to it than that. Far from having a single aura, I learned that the aura I Saw when I activated my second sight nowdays was merely the by-product of the paths of energy called "meridians" that spiraled throughout the body. Not only were these meridians constantly flowing inward and out with the body's vital energy for the body's physical well being but they also carried the essence of the bodies spiriutal and emotional wellbeing too! There were also "pools" that the Draconians called Foci where the energy collected, was recycled, purified, and made new again to travel along the meridians of the body once more. The meridians were tied together and flowed in unison but each kind of meridian eventually separated into a different pathway to flow through thier own different kinds of Foci in order to be purified; all of them however eventually flowed through one point, one Foci which they called a Source Foci. This Source Foci was inherited from our parents and was the seed from which we grew.

It was possible to manipulate these meridians within a persons body. The Draconians could manipulate the pathways of Gaea through communing with Ougura and the other sacred seals and commanding the Elementals, they could also do the same thing on a much smaller scale, using their own will and the bodies energy pathways to command a body to heal from physical, spiritual and emotional energy. So too could I use my own energies to both heal myself and others, not just of physical wounds but of wounds on the heart and soul.

I was surprised to note that I had already been doing some rudimentary form of this healing for sometime now, but that it had placed me in danger. An empath was one who sensed the heart and emotions of others around them as though they were thier own emotions and this very sense created a danger of forgetting which feelings belnged to whom and of losing ones sense of self to another forever. It had been a near thing; perhaps if i had not fallen in love with Van and had such a strong reason to remain myself it would have happened that I would have become lost.

There had been times, times after a trying day when i was feeling down and exhausted, times when nothing seemed to go my way and I felt drained and depressed; it had come upon me in those times. I hadn't even had to touch another person to get visions; all I had to do was hold something of someone elses and I would know them know what they were feeling and everything about them. It would make me question whether those emotions and memories inside my mind were actually someone elses or my own and I just didn't know it.

I had sometimes woken in the night after a trying day and I hadn't known where I was at first; I could have sworn for a moment that I was someone else, that I belonged somewhere else until a few moments later when the world righted itself again. But sometimes, if only for a few moments, there were times when I wasn't certain who I was. Usually after such an unsettling experience I'd withdraw back into my room and wouldn't ome out for a while just so that I could make certain that I really was who I knew myself to be.

Reaching out for Van often helped me remind me of myself.

The lessons continued one after another. I was taught to sheild myself in order to block others out and center my own heart so that I would always know my own Self from anyone else's. After those lessons I was taught many different kinds of sheilds because there were predators among the Source Elementals who could prey upon the unsuspecting mind. From there I was taught how to cast a sheild around other people and then how to erect a spirit-barrier that would transcend even to the physical world.

Now that I knew how to protect myself by keeping others out and myself in, I was in no danger of losing myself and the real lessons could begin. I was taught how to manipulate the energy patterns within ones own body to heal them of their wounds; first the physical (which was surprisingly the easiest of the lot, one only had to remind the body of what it needed to do in order to be healthy and send it the commands to do it) then of the mind (which was a delicate process but the mind can be as tough as it can be fragile) and then the heart which came most naturally to me. The lesson then turned to a more sinister side; how to bind a persons Foci. This meant that no energy would flow into or out of the Meridians of the body and they would stay in a state of stasis (on Earth we call it a coma). From there the lessons proceeded on how to commune with Gaea and manipulate the planets energy patterns... except that now there were none to manipulate so I couldn't imagine that the knowledge would be useful to me. I learned how the people of Atlantis had created their own energists and pendants from the energy of hteir own bodies and wills and used them to commune with the machine directly. From there we reached the knowledge of how to bind and seal an elemental once it had left its physical body but before it could enter the astral plane and escape. It was this knowledge that I was to use when tracking the Source Elementals later on. I was taught to search out with my heart and mind in order to sense any usual patterns in the energy around me. And I was taught so many things...

It felt like I was there for a year absorbing one lesson after another, understanding all knowledge and making it part of myself. Then suddenly the flood stopped, just cut off, and I was cast out of the heart of the sacred seal and back into my body. I blinked my eyes. It was night time for the cathedral was lit only by the light coming up from the glowing sacred spring and the light dancing off the energist hovering above me.

What day was it? What YEAR was it? My head hurt a little, like I'd spent to long studying over my books and I needed to rest. Automatically I sunk within myself, traveled through the nearest Foci to the meridian that led to my temples and soothed away the pressure there. My headache faded and I felt surprisingly alert. Alert enough to notice what I had just done without even really thinking about it.

I blinked a little in surprise but then shrugged. Why should I not use my knowledge and powers so, they were undeniably a part of me were they not? it was only natural that I should use them without thinking. It had felt as easy as breathing, as automatic as my heartbeat.

Okay so now I was a fully trained... well, I'm not sure what to call myself but whatever it was I knew everything I needed to know about how to use my powers. For the first time since I'd been knocked blindside by my very first Vision, I felt absolutely, one-hundred-percent comfortable within my own skin. I didn't see myself or my powers as weird. I wasn't abnormal or a _freak_; I was what I was. I could accept myself as that and not feel the need to hide. If anyone had a problem with it... tough nueggies.


	11. Chapter 11

I emerged from the doors of the temple to find Allen sitting in a meditative pose with his sword across his lap, waiting there.

"Allen?" I said, a little surprised. "What are you doing here?"

He looked a little abashed, coughed into his hand once and reluctantly said

"In a trial for knighthood it is traditional for an older, more experienced knight to stand guard outside the place where the childe, or knight-to-be takes his vigil. Even thought you're not going to be a knight, I felt that I should do something at least. You've gone to much trouble to help me, and my family. It was the only thing I could think of."

"Oh," I said, a little touched. "Well thank-you for the thought anyway. I'm done here."

"But you were only in there for a day!" Allen protested. "Even the most rudimentary of spiritual training takes months at the least. How could you have acquired the knowledge of a fully trained… whatever-you-are in so short a time?"

"Where there is a Will there is a way," I said, unwilling to really discuss the subject.

I was still somewhat sorting the thing out in my head as it was. In my own mind I felt like I had been in there for years learning everything and yet in the rest of the world it had been no more than a day. The mind became greater somehow when a persons spirit was inside Ougura. I knew all I needed to know, and I was ready this day.

"I have all of the knowledge I require, I just don't have any real practice in using it. My reserves of energy and endurance to use my powers are still those of a novice… but in the case of your sister, my knowledge alone will likely be sufficient."

"Likely?" questioned Allen. "The way you say that makes me nervous."

"What I am about to do is the spiritual equivalent of a surgery," I explained. "And as with any surgery, I can make no guarantees that it will be successful. All I can tell you is that I believe it will be."

"Your belief is a strong thing Hitomi," Allen said. "I will simply have to put my faith in that then."

"Come, wake your sister and we shall start," I said. "After I have had a bath and changed out of these clothes, that is."

An hour later I had cleansed in one of the holy springs nearby, the energy that flowed from the Ourgura Seal permeated the holy waters and just soaking in them gave me a sense of well-being. I dressed in some kind of strange kimono-like robe provided to me by one of the temple attendants; a the top was white with long bell-like sleeves and togged closed with a row of frog-and-toggle knots down the left side the pants were sapphire blue and voluminous.

"This way mi'lady," the temple attendant said bowing respectfully to me. It had apparently been a long time since someone had been trained by Ougura itself. I followed the attendant who did not seem inclined to give me her name through a white stone-lined path leading through a small wild garden with elegantly placed trees and decorative fountains and a series of springs and bridges, the light of stone lanterns reflected off the waters. I would have taken more time to admire the elegant gardens but all too soon the path widened out into a soft clearing with a misty spring the size of a small lake. There was a wide decorative stone bridge that led across half the span of the lake to a small island in the center that held a pagoda sheltering Celena, Allen and High Preist Lagusu.

High Preist Lagusu and his two apprentices were going to accompany me and assist in this most dangerous of undertakings. Lagusu to mentor me through m first true attempted spiritual healing and guide me in case I should begin to fail or grow unsure of myself. For though I had all of the knowledge and my spirit knew the hows, whys, and wherefores my body had yet to actually perform any such thing, and I was nervous.

At an encouraging nod from the High Preist I activated my othersight and examined Celena carefully.

Wow! I thought in amazement as I noted the difference between a trained Gift and an untrained one. Everything is so much clearer! What had once been noting more than a colorful but indistinct haze surrounding the body of a person was now made of soft points of light in a line down the body, and many many soft little glowing lines weaving in and out between them in a complex web. The Aura I had gotten used to seeing around peoples bodies were actually radiating out from their Focus Points!

By looking at Celena I could tell that not only had Dilandau perverted and wrapped about her emotional and mental Meridians but her physical meridians as well. He was going to have to be removed completely from her and placed in a separate body all of his own; we couldn't just borrow a corpse so we'd have to create one for him. It was here in the most sacred of the Sacred Springs of Ubdo that we would have access to the power to will such a thing into being.

Naturally, Lagusua had chosen a spring on the outside of the energist to minimize interference from the seal, in case it should somehow go rogue in the presence of our ritual and gift Dilandau with a piece of it's Source Energist. The idea of Dilandau merging with a Source Energist was not to be thought of.

"Could such a thing happen?" Allen questioned a little skeptically when I told him why we were placed so far away from the temple where the source of power was housed.

"It isn't entirely out of the realm of possibility," Lagusu said. "The Ougura Seal has absorbed a great deal of the twisted energy from the Fate Alteration Device and Dilandau was made of that same energy, it might create a resonance with the seal once he is separated from the dampening effects of your dear sister young man."

I sent out a spirit call to Folken as well, just to have all of my bases covered.

:Stand by please: I told him when he raised an eyebrow inquiringly about my summons. :I do not know that granting him a physical body will be successful and if his spirit is powerful enough I believe he may prove a danger that we do not have the means to stop. I want you to nab him on the astral plane if that is the case.:

:Yes: Folken replied, noddingonce.

Allen stood with his sister Celena on a small island in the center of hte outdoor spring the spirit of Folken stood tensely beside him, poised to strike at Dilandau spirit form in case we could not conjure a body and he should take it onto himself to try to find one on his own. Lagusu stood across from me on the other side of the water and his two apprentices equidistant to either side. As one we stepped into the holy waters and cast out a barrier shield both to protect ourselves from outside interference and to protect the outside world from our powerful energies in case something should go wrong.. My first physical casting of a barrier shield was an odd experience; it was like I was out my thought to encompass everything around me, understanding that area and then simultaneously blocking it out and closing it in. With the barrier in place the real working could begin.

I could feel him chafing at the bit, still trying to dominate over Celena; this time we let him. His efforts to establish his own identity over hers would only aid us in our own attempts. Unfortunately, because the Sorcerers of Zaibach hadn't had much of a clue on what they were doing when they created Dilandau, they had messed his and Celena's energy patterns up severely before getting a successful experiment. That meant I was going to have to be very careful when I made the extraction; I would probably have to take him out in bits and pieces in order to get a clean removal.

I steeled my nerves, and set to work. First was to bind their Foci. This would freeze up their meridians thus enabling me to distinguish one from another more easily when they weren't flowing. This was the easy part of the task. I took a deep breath and started in. Once their Foci were bound that twin spirits slept peacefully I began the delicate, delicate work of traveling down each twisting, spiraling meridian in their body one by one and untangling their two different energy signatures from one another.

I started with the meridians of their physical shell and as I worked to separate them Celena faded to a specter. Allen steeled himself at the pain of seeing his only sister fade so much but trusted in me to do the job without harming her as much as was possible. As with any surgery, it was by far no certain thing. As I untwisted each of Dilandau's meridians from where they tangled with Celena's I twirled them round into a little ball and set them aside to deal with later so that I would not have to go back and repeat the process of untangling more meridians when I had finished with her. Tiny globes of spirit-light danced in a pale glow over the water's surface.

It was rather like having a massive pile of string that the cat had been playing with tangled at your feet and patiently and carefully working out the knot until it was all straightened. It took hours! Once I was finished with their physical meridians I had to then move on to their emotional and spiritual ones. It was far easier to tell these ones apart; where Celena's were bright and glowing with health, Dilandau's were blackened and blotted with rage and hatred. If it had been only a tiny spot of such dark rage I could have helped and healed him but his all of the entirety of his meridians were blighted so. He was not mentally or emotionally well, and the damage was not something that could ever be repaired save by utterly erasing his entire mind and personality from the meridians and starting over from scratch, but with that method there would be nothing left of Dilandau as we knew the guy. Part of me thought it would be better that way but I had no right to make such a decision, I would heal what harm I could and interfere only in such a way as to return the natural balance to the way it should be.

By the time, hours later, I had at last managed to extricate every trace of Dilandau from Celena's mind, heart, and body my own strength and energy reserves had begun to fail. It was after all my own energy I was using to guide the delicate process and it wasn't like using a solid tool like a knife or a scalpel. It was more like walking at a brisk pace up a slight incline; not a problem at the very first but after a long way it began to take its toll. Using spiritual energy or physical energy was still using energy. Lagusu and his two apprentices summoned up personal energists of their own (yet another thing I had learned that people could do, set aside energy to use at a later date, and I mentally reprimanded myself for not thinking to do so earlier) and they kindly sent the energy at me to bolster my flagging strength. It was like getting a second wind and I doggedly pushed onward, determined to complete the procedure.

Now came the tricky part, in order to create a physical body for Dilandau I had had to borrow a piece of Source Energist from the Seal at the Holy Spring because Dilandau had no Source Foci of his own (because he had no actual parents). Using he Source energist as Dilandaus Source Foci I needed to take all of those meridians I had just separated out and re-weave them into a fully separated Dilandau.

I sent tok the piece of Source Energist, still not fully healed from splintering off from the corrupted main, and tried to purify its taint using my powers. The piece of Source Energist, apparently had other plans however. It fought me, the warped dangerous greeny-black energy of corrupted energy tangling with my own which had the unfortunate effect of "like attracting like" as they say. Dilandau's own separated energy foci zeroed in on it like a heat-guided missle, the corrupted strands of his own energy patterns unwove themselves from the neat little balls I had spun them into and began trying to anchor themselves in the Source Foci! It was an unfortunate complication that only got worse.

The holy spring itself, that drew its power from the great seal energist started to resonate with the song of energy coming off from the crystal. I was busy battling away the threads of what had once been Dilandau's meridians while Lagusu and the two others tried to handle the situation with the waters of the spring trying to attract themselves into the mess we had going on with the enrgist. We were surrounded in the midst of a swirling vortex of energy in no time, the water glowed a tainted green as it shlepped and lapped about my feet, trying to get closer before I managed to purify the energist stone before me. The barrier sheild we had erected (and our own wills holding it up) were the only thing keeping it from bursting inward and overwhelming us.

Bugger this! I thought in frustration. I had not come this far just to lose it all now and if I couldn't pull things together then Celena would never wake up. I genuinely liked the girl, we had a lot in common I had discovered from liking the same kinds of books to enjoying a good shopping trip. She'd introduced me to her favorite Gaea sweet-shop and I'd shown her my all-time favorite romantic movies. We were like sisters in our hearts!

I reached down into my powers and burned away the Taint inside the crystal with a swamping wave that left me momentarily weak-kneed and then started in on the mess surrounding me. Now that the Source Foci (to-be) was purified, Dilandau's energy patterns wanted nothing to do with it! Instead the threads of life-energy tried to merge with the equally tainted holy waters swirling around us.

I reached out with my powers and roughly gathered the rampaging energies swirling about me, packing it crudely together like one might pack a snowball. When there got to be too much for me to handle and I felt like I had fire flowing along in my veins instead of blood I set my will into it with a simple command... Live! With a last burst of strength I sent my energies exploding outwards to gather up the power, then I reversed the flow of my powers and sucked it back inwards, swamping us all with water and light. I used the last of my strength to burn away the creeping green miasma from the water.

It was all or nothing!

There was an enormous flare of blue-white light that blinded me as energy burst out all around us, battering at the barrier sheild which at last fell from the blow. A hot wind kicked up from out of nowhere blowing water about. I no longer knew what was happening but I prayed that Celena and her brother were okay as I sank to my knees, unable to do more.

The tempest died down abruptly until only a few seconds later there was nothing more than silence and the ripples of water falling back onto the pond. I looked around me, amazed that we were safe. I and the High Preist walked carefully toward the part gathered on island and saw that there were indeed more people there than the two we had originally started with. I blinked my eyes in shock and amazement. It couldn't be!

But there he was, in full, _living_ flesh lying (well, _naked_...) beside the one I had gone to great lengths to separate out from my new best friend Celena. There he was... Folken Fanel.

Talk about your lucky accidents, I thought dryly.

He had been standing by, ready to attack Dilandau in spirit form in case our attempt to recreate a physical body for him should fail. It appeared that he had gotten caught up in the momentum of events and the command and power I had sent out to neutralize the situation had worked its way upon _him_ as well.

Allen was the first to recover, he checked on and roused his sister shortly after he regained consciousness. Celena said she felt fine; better than fine actually, she could no longer see him or hear him inside her mind and it was an enormous relief to know that he was gone for good this time. Speaking of Dilandau...

He roused himself as he did everything; with as much noise and violence as possible. It took him only a moment to take stock of his surroundings before he attacked the nearest thing standing to him. That being me I was glad that he was still not at full strength just yet and I automatically threw him over my hip and into the water where he fell facedown. Allen moved quickly, drawing his sword and placing it at the back of the guy's neck as a warning that he would either behave or be beheaded.

I sighed. I really hadn't thought far enough ahead on this one. I had been concentrating so hard on getting Dilandau out of Celena's and Allen's hair that I hadn't really considered much about what we would do with him after we pried the little weed out.

"So now that we have him out of her," I mused aloud. "What are we going to do about him? We can't keep him here, we've already imposed upon the good nature of the denizens of the Holy Spring Ubdo long enough. He's too dangerous to simply let go to wander the wilderness, who knows what kind of trouble he could get up to."

"I hope you aren't talking about me," Folken said, sitting up with a groan. He looked surprised for the first time I had ever seen him. Usually Folken had one of two settings for his facial expression; cool-depressed and cool-amused. The look made him seem pretty human.

"I-...I am alive?" he said, looking like he didn't quite dare to believe it.

"Yes," I said watching as he looked in awe at his two fully functional, fleshy hands like he'd never seen hands before.

"A strange side-effect from the spring," Lagusu said. "But with that Dornkirks blasted machine making everything go crazy, nothing is working quite like it should be."

"Could somebody get him a towel please?" I requested. He was after all, stark naked, no matter that he was up to his waist in spring water.

A nearby attendant who had come when the commotion occurred rushed forward with two cloaks, one for Folken and one for Dilandau.

With the realization that all was well for the moment and that I was done all the strength that adrenaline had seemed to give me simply flowed away from my body leaving once more drained and exhausted. For now I think I just needed to...

And the world faded out.

I woke in a comfortable bed, warm and cozy and decidedly disinclined to move for the moment. The decision was taken away from me however by the sound of shouts and ringing steel.

"Get the hell out of my way damn you!" a dismayingly familiar voice yelled. I heard the sound of a sword ringing against a sword several times and Allen replied that if Dilandau wanted to escape, he'd have to go through him.

"My pleasure," Dilandau said in that bloodthirsty tone of his. "I'll cut right through you!" There was more sword-noise and I hopped out of bed, grabbing the nearest pair of pants in my reach, the same ones I'd worn the other day, and hurried out to the courtyard where all the commotion was.

There they all were; Dilandau was facing off against Allen with Folken at his side. Celena stood off to one side wringing her hands and looking frightened and upset.

"Please, don't fight them Dilandau!" she begged.

"Stay out of it wench!" he snapped. "Now that I'm free, nothing will stand in my way!"

I sighed a little. I really hadn't thought too far ahead on this one had I? I should have known he'd do something like this, crazy little psychopath.

I summoned up the energy I'd regained while sleeping and slapped a barrier around him. Unfortunately it wasn't quite strong enough to physically detain him, The stubborn parasite, and he charged right through it. Well, it looked like I was going to have to think of something else then.

"Could you maybe hurry up with that a little Hitomi?" Folken urged as they tried to work Dilandau into a corner without hurting him. Apparently they still weren't certain whether an injury to one would be an injury to the other. Perhaps it was a valid fear, I still didn't know whether the separation of the two of them was actually a complete one or not.

"I'm thinking, I'm thinking!" I replied, wracking my brain for a way to hold him. His spirit and mind were so warped that they were likely beyond my ability to control; I could handle a healthy mind just fine but one as messed up as Dilandau's was beyond anyone's ability to reach. Well, anyone except perhaps...

My gaze focused on Celena.

There might still be just enough resonance between them to work in some kind of command of subjugation through her!

"Celena," I called. "I need your permission to work with your meridians again."

"What are you going to do?" she asked absently, her entire attention focused on the fight before her.

"I think there may be a way that I can reach Dilandau through you, but I'll need your permission to do it." That was one thing I had learned about healing, it only worked when the person involved gave their consent. Perhaps i was bending the rules a bit when it came to Dilandau but desperate times called for desperate measures.

"You have it then," Celena said. "Anything to stop this fight so that my brother doesn't get hurt." I thought about reminding her that Allen was a swordsman and so thus likely to get hurt at one point or another but decided against it. She probably already knew that.

I wasted no time in sinking back into her meridian network to see what I had to work with. They were two polar opposites but they had shared a body if not a mind and soul for most of their lives; while they didn't have any common bonds connecting the two of them, their meridians did resonate with each other still. It wasn't much but it was something. I snagged one of the meridian's spiraling out from her Source Foci and sent it twisting toward Dilandau, if I was lucky, they were still enough alike that they would catch and hold onto one another. It was a bit like spinning two threads together.

And they did, there was still enough resonance between them to create a bond between their bodies. I bound up Dilandau's Foci so that the connection only went one way and turned to Celena.

"Celena!" I called. "Reign Dilandau in!"

"What?" she asked, justifiably confused. I tried to think of a way to tell her to give a good yank on that cord I'd just made but realized that she wouldn't know what in the world I was talking about or how to do it even if she did.

"Picture something stopping him in your mind and put your whole heart into it. Then say... um... heel!"

Celena looked at me a little oddly but closed her eyes and concentrated. The cord glowed for a moment as she said heel, like one would restrain a disobedient cur. Dilandau found his neck jerked back by an invisible choke-chain. He yelped and I couldn't restrain a giggle. It did look kinda funny. He went at Allen again and Celena restrained him again, this time a little more firmly as she seemed to gain confidence from her own strength.

Dilandau, no fool despite being psychotic, turned towards her and decided he'd take the problem at it's source before moving on to take care of his enemies.

"Uh-oh," Celena gasped, frightened. She tried to back up a pace or two in preparation to run for her life.

"Don't give way," I told her. "It's what he wants. If you do, then he knows he's more powerful than you are."

"He _is_ more powerful," Celena replied fearfully.

"Don't be daft, of course he isn't," I said. "Just because he has a sword doesn't mean anything. You have the ability to stop him in his tracks; use it."

"I'm too scared," Celena said.

Oh that's right, fear does inhibit the using of energy. 

"Calm down, take a deep breath, and let him _have_ it," I advised. She couldn't rely on other's all of the time, sooner or later she was going to have to depend on her own strength. Perhaps now was not the best time for her to start learning that lesson but the world was seldom as we would have it.

Celena, trembling in every bone in her body, took a shaky breath and shouted

"Dilandau! Heel!"

Not only was he brought up short by a choker this time, he received and extra little shock along with it to reprimand him for his bad behavior. Alright Celena!

Folken and Allen came up along either side of the guy and put thier swords at his throat saying without words that even if Celena and I were not willing to kill him they had no such qualms. He backed down and subsided into good behavior, or what passed for it for Dilandau. That meant that while he might be shouting and cursing at us all very imaginatively he at least wasn't trying to kill anyone.

Ah, another wonderful start to an eventful day.

I was hungry. I hadn't been awake for five minutes after collapsing from some seriously difficult work involving the complex manipulation of energy patterns when I'm at it again. You know how I mentioned that all use of power has a cost; well all that energy manipulation came from me and it needed to be replaced pronto. The best and easiest way to do this, I was told, was with food.

Luckily for me and my short hunger-temper (you know, the one you always get when you're hungry and you haven't eaten in a while?) the Draconians were well familiar with the toll that energy manipulation took on the body and had perfected the art of the carb-diet. I was eating pasta like a pro wrestler. Where Freid had specialized in many different kinds of curry and thier incredibly string tea that they called Kaiyiber and Asturian cuisine consisted mostly of artfully prepared fish in a variety of subtle dishes (the closest earth food I could compare it to would probably be French gourmet), Draconians seemed to prefer pasta. Their noodles were thicker than I was accustomed to and had been fried lightly before they were added to whatever sauce that the Draconians made for them but they were quite good.

After Allen and Folken had bound Dilandau up in so many ropes he looked like a mummy they carried the struggling, cursing, screaming boy in to eat breakfast with the rest of us, plunking ungently nearby and tieing him further to a chair. The ubiquitous attendants to the temple in their white and blue robes laid out a full breakfast for me and all of my friends on the table in the public room of what must have been the guest lodge.

"Now that the problem with Celena is taken care of," I said seriously over breakfast in the guest suite where we were staying.

"For the most part anyway," I amended as Dilandau growled and tried to gnaw his way through the ropes that Allen and Folken had bound him up in. He snapped at poor Celena as she graciously tried to spoon feed him a little something, the sweet girl was utterly convinced that the reason he was so grumpy right then was just that he was hungry. Yeah, right.

I decided that I nice walk around the place would do me some good, clear my head a bit. I knew I could use my powers reliably now and in a far different way than I had ever imagined in my wildest dreams; who would have thought that I'd have the ability to manipulate lines and points of energy? It still amazed me but it was a fact. Despite the feeling of utter wellness that I'd had yesterday today was a new day and it occured to me to start feeling a little weird about my strange powers. It also occured to me to start feeling even weirder about the mission I was about to be sent on.

Am I really up to this? I wondered. Merely being powerful wasn't enough, I'd have to be smart, determined, heroic and who knew what else. I'd have to be things that I didn't know how to be. I wasn't any of those things, not really. I was scared. I'd accepted this mission but all I really wanted to do deep down was go back home, climb into my bed, pull the covers over my head and hope the world didn't notice me.

I stared down at my fidgeting hands.

I made my choice, I reminded myself. I've already accepted the responsibility of doing this task. 

But oh it seemed so big, and all that great shadowy unknown future seemed to loom so frighteningly at me. Maybe I wasn't up to this after all. But if I wasn't up to it... then who would do it?

"The heart is indeed a wonderous thing," a kind, elderly voice said off to one side of me. "The power of Atlantis is the power of the heart you know. All of the energy, crystlized will."

"So I've heard," I replied.

"I will tell you a great secret," Lagusu said, sitting down on the stone bench beside me. "It is not just the Atlantians that have the power to change the world through human will; everyone does. We do it every day. With every action, with every choice, we leave the world a little different than we found it. Better sometimes, or worse, depending... but different. We change each other too, love them, fear them, pressure them, heal them. That's also part of the power of the heart. Just imagine Hitomi, why there could be power within a single soul to, well, change the whole universe! And that may just be the greatest secret of all."

"I don't have a very strong heart," I said. "I rely too much on Van. I don't feel easy or confident without him there."

"That's only to be expected. No-one is meant to stand alone after all. The greatest souls in history never triumph all by themselves. The universe understands this and provides for it."

"Huh?" I asked, intelligently.

"The human heart can be as fragile as it can be strong. It can stand against the worst that the world can throw at it without flinching when it's true or shatter at a touch when it's reached its limit. The heart can be easily swayed by danger and uncertainty. That's when we find other souls to help us remain strong in the face of our fears."

"I have someone I seek when I'm worried, but he has enough to worry about right now and I don't want to give him too much."

"Him is it?" Lagusu said. He looked long and meditavely at me. "You share a... conection with this person?"

"We understand each others hearts like no other; and our feelings always reach each other."

His eyebrows raised nearly to his hairline. It was a long pause when he finally said

"We Draconians believe that every soul has power in it, but that some souls are born with a special force, a gravity for great events if you will. They're often at the nexus of great change, they have a sort of force that events seem to naturally unfold around. We call it Ashu Kreshtona: the Force of Destiny. It's as if they can take the threads of fate a re-weave the fabric of future history all through the power of their hearts. We believe that universe bears them into the places where they can do the greatest good; if they so choose. Though they may be placed in the position they are most needed for at the time, they are still mortal and their hearts are as easily swayed by danger and uncertainty as the next. We Draconians believe that the ashu kreshtona are born with a sort of fail-safe a way to keep their hearts strong and pure in the face of the great troubles, fears, and responsibility that being so special will demand of them."

"A fail-safe?" I asked. "What kind of fail-safe?"

"The comfort of one soul in the world finding its perfect complement in another such," Lagusu said, peering at me intently. "A sacred and holy bond created by the universe itself to entwine two threads of greatness together to make a stronger whole."

"I don't quite..." I trailed off.

"You know that Varie came from this Enclave," he said, in an abrupt change of topic. One minute we had been talking about the very fabric of existence and the next... the dead draconian queen, Van's mother.

"I should have guessed," I said. "The lake's right near here."

"Varie was the most powerfully Gifted of the Draconians that our kind had seen in three generations," Lagusu said in his maundering sort of way. "She could see the pathways of energy, see the Elementals, as well as command them. She had a very special relationship with Ougura too. She was the pride of our Enclave and we all knew she was destined for greatness."

"You must have been most upset when she left," I said.

"We knew that one day she would," Lagusu replied. "It was prophesied on the day that she was born that when she had reached four and twenty years as the Mystic Moon and its younger sibling rose over the western mountains; she would go to that lake and meet..."

"The one she was destined for," I finished for him. "I saw that in a vision once when I touched Van's---ergh, nevermind." I cut myself off in an effort to salvage Van's secret; he probably wouldn't thank me for bringing up the knowledge of his being a draconian and blabbing it to all and sundry in normal conversation.

"Feather," Lagusu replied imperturbably. "Or his wings. Either one."

"How do _you_ know about that?" I asked. As far as I knew, the knowledge that Van was a Draconian was strictly hush-hush.

"How could we not?" Lagusu said with easy humor. "It wasn't exactly a state secret that his mother was Draconian, and if he was really fortunate, he would inherit the wings from her."

"My head hurts," I said. "And I still don't get it, why tell _me_ all of this?"

"Because Lady Varie's prophesy did not stop there," Lagusu said.

"There's more?" I questioned.

"Oh indeed, much more," Lagusu agreed. "Twenty years of peace, would follow the Joining of the Ashu threads. At the time of the new Dragon King's ascenscion, the force of destiny would move. It would block the hand that reached forth to consume all of Gaea, the hand that came from the moon but sprouted fingers of this world."

"I understand that last part, it was talking about Dornkirk," I said, puzzling my way through it. "That probably wouldn't make sense unless you actually knew that he'd come from Earth though. But it was definitely talking about the Zaibach Empire."

"Yes," Lagusu said. "The prophesy spoke of Varies thread. Goau was her Soul-bonded Mate. Their threads entwined at their inception to give them the strength to become a force of destiny in the fullness of time."

"But they just settled down and had children," I argued skeptically. "Aren't forces of destiny supposed to be a little more _proactive_?"

"But you forget child, at this time there was another who meddled in the forces of destiny, another who sought to make the power of the Ashu Keshtona come to him and act upon his will."

"Dornkirk and his fate experiments," I said, with a sinking feeling in my gut. He nodded in the manner of a teacher whose student had made the connection.

"His experiments warped the threads in fates tapestry as we have seen with dear Celena," he continued. "They affected more than the individual in question, they created holes in fate's designs, holes that rippled out to all of the other threads having unforeseen reactions. One of these reactions nearly ruined the design completely and certainly interfered with the way the prophesy was supposed to fall into place."

"How?" I asked. "How was it supposed to fall into place?"

"King Goau was supposed to have lived for the remainder of the twenty years, for one," Lagusu said regretfully. "Varie's soul bonded mate was never _supposed_ to have died. The two of them were to be the ones to defeat the Empire when their son, Folken, took the throne. Dornkirks mucking about with fate cut his thread short leaving Varie without the piece to complete her place in the prophesy."

"She grieved," I said sadly. "I can't imagine what its like to loose a piece of your soul forever."

"At the time," Lagusu continued after a small pause for respect for the departed. "We decided that perhaps we had mis-read the prophesy; the optimistic thought occurred to us that perhaps the Joining of the Ashu threads in Varie and Goau was for the purpose of creating a new ashu thread and that that would be the one to defeat the Empire before it could overrun our world. We decided that Folken Fanel was the one to fulfill the prophesy after he ascended to the throne."

"Folken never ascended to the throne, It was Van who-" I started.

"The tapestry of fates design was greatly warped by Dornkirks interference," he explained gently. "We believe that the former emperor interfered directly this time with the prophesy by deliberately swaying Folken to their side in order to avert their own demise."

"It fits, and it _sounds_ like something _he'd_ do," I muttered darkly.

"After his disappearance, Varie searched desperately for her missing son, not just for her own sake but for the sake of Gaea's future. We believed at the time that only Folken would be the Dragon King to ascend the throne and halt the darkness."

"And then...?" I questioned.

"Fate had to work very quickly I imagine," Lagusu said, his eyes twinkling with amusement. "There were no other Draconians of the appropriate power to reverse the effects of Dornkirks machine so we had no choice but to sit back and watch and wait to see what happened. Time passed and in that time the last potential Dragon King prepared to ascend the throne. Imagine our surprise when we felt Fate act."

"He was brought to me, and I was brought here," I said.

"And that... was the beginning of it."

"So you think I'm one of those special souls, that Ashy Fleshtoner," I said, not entirely certain I liked the sound of it. All this being jerked around by some cosmic puppet-master toying with my strings didn't set well with me.

"My dear, there is not a doubt in my mind of it," Lagusu assured me emphatically.

"And you think that Van and I are Soul-bonded Mates," I said.

"Do you not sense it for yourself?" He said, sounding surprised. "You feel him in every breath you take, sense his heart within yours, feel his thoughts in the distant corners of your mind."

"Only when I'm not paying attention," I grumbled. "For the most part I figure that it's better to try to keep the two of us separate, seeing as we live on two separate worlds."

"You feel the empty place that he is supposed to fill," Lagusu said.

"Look bub, that's private. There won't be any filling for quite a while yet!" I snapped.

He merely looked at me as if I had missed the point. I probably had.


	12. Chapter 12

"I need to start tracking down those Source Elementals," I continued. "I can already sense the ones from the Ougura seal moving around here in Fanelia. I think bonding with the seal-energist like I have makes me sensitive to them. There's one a few miles from here to the north."

"It looks like we should get started then," Amano said.

"Are you guys really okay with this?" I asked again for about the third time that morning. "I mean, I know that traipsing about in the wilderness can't be your idea of a fun time, it certainly isn't mine. If you want I can send you back to Earth and just start out on my own."

"For the last time Hitomi," Yukari said with exasperation. "We're your friends and we're with you on this one hundred percent!"

"Besides," Amano added. "We've only tried the sake from Freid and the vino from Asturia, I'm sure there are many other new drinks on this world for us to try and I for one will not rest until we have tasted them all. This is our true quest, to find the best beverage on all of Gaea."

"And a noble one it is," I seconded.

The three of us shouted kanpai! and clinked our glasses together.

"And shopping," I added. "Don't forget the shopping."

Folken looked up over at me from where he stood, enraptured, listening to his own heartbeat.

"Shopping? You have been tasked with hunting down powerful and dangerous rogue Elementals and all you can think about is shopping?"

"What can I say, I may have these powers but I'm still a seventeen year-old girl at heart," I retorted. "I love to shop."

I was curious to see what kind of goods Fanelia might have to offer an eager connosuier like myself. The clothes, the jewelry, the fun little knick-knacks for me to put on my shelf! I hadn't had hardly any time at all for my favorite past-time the last time I'd been on Gaea and I was detirmined not to miss anything this time.

"Now she looks like a woman on a mission," Folken said dryly. "If she acted like that on her quest to find Source Elementals there'd be no stopping her." I sent a glare in his direction for the remark.

I thanked Lagusu and the rest for thier aid to me and my friends and they in turn bid me hurry and find thier Source Elementals. It wasn't altruism but need that had made them help me, but I couldn't deny that we were both benefiting and I was glad that I at least had something offer them in return for all of the help and care they had given to me.

Not knowing what else to di with Dilandau, we shoved him tied up in the back between Folken and Allen when we all piled into Amano's SUV and started out. Once again we had the thing crammed to capacity with Amano and Yukari in front, me and Celena second row, and Allen, Folken and Dilandau in the back seat plus all of our camping gear and other equipment in the very back end.

The roads were fun as usual but I wished we had a bit more to go on other than... "I can sense it just a little more off to the east, turn east Amano." "Turn? Turn where? There aren't any more roads around here, where am I supposed to turn?" Couldn't Gaea have produced at least one good road map? As it was we had to rely on Folken's rather hazy memory of the southern Fanelian road system; most of what he remembered from learning Fanelian geography as a kid was what province belonged to which lord and how that related to the tithe system. Not very useful when we're looking for roads to get us close to a rogue Elemental. Folken had to admit that roads were somewhat of a rarity in Fanelia. I asked him why and he said simply that the ground was covered in snow more often than not.

We were a few hours on an eastern road along the edge of Fanelia's southern border that Folken vaguely recalled led to the mountains that traversed a good part of Fanelian terrain.

Curious now, I asked him about his country, since even though we'd touched on the subject a tme or two, I didn't actually know a whole lot about Van's homeland. Folken sketched a map. I admitted to some surprise when he showed me the finished sketch. It was actually a lot bigger than I had been led to beleive and I said as much.

"That's odd," I said. "Everything I've ever heard anyone say about Fanelia is that it's this tiny bucolic little country out in the back of nowhere."

"Hey!" Folken said, a little stung.

I shrugged helplessly in innocense. That's just what I'd been led to believe.

"It IS a tiny buccolic little country," Dilandau said snidely from where he sat. "Sooner or later the entire population is just going to get eaten by their dragons!"

"We'll be sure to throw you to them first of all then," I snapped from where I sat. I knew we should have gagged him as well but Celena wouln't hear of it.

"Wel it is and it isn't," Folken said. "It's large in size..."

"But most of the land can't be lived on?" I guessed.

I looked down at the map Folken had drawn.

Fanelia boasted home to arms of mountain ranges sweeping down on the eastern and western sides of Fanelia from a bitterly cold range far to the north that, according to Folken, stayed frozen over all year round. The western mountain range, which was called Kamchatka, was (also predictably) volcanically active. The hot springs south of the hills along the border that we had just left behind us probably were heated by the geothermal heat from that mountain range. The eastern range which was called Tukatch, in Fanelia eventually flowed down southward and hugged the coastline in Asuria and bacame the Chatatal mountains there. Tukatch mountains were home to three of Fanelia's largest settlements, the trade-town of Adom near to the south, the village of Arzas a little farther north, and finally Fanelia City just a little ways distant. On the other side of the Tukatch mountains was, surprisingly a little bit of ocean. Granted, it was in the northern part of the land and Folken explained that the coastline was all cliff (something we called fjords) and practically unavigable due to all of the tiny little islands dotting out from the shore (an archipelago which was probably a submerged mountain range). The middle valley in between the two mountain ranges was predictably bisected by a river (all that snowmelt had to go somewhere after all). I was betting the river, while large was probably wide and shallow in the summer, a great place for fishing for trout or salmon.

Folken seemed surprised at my knowledge of geography.

"Shall I continue to impress you with my sagacity?" I teased.

"No!" shouted Dilandau. "It's boring, wench!"

Just for that... I thought.

"Fanelia is rich in mineral deposits," I said, deliberately pitching my voice like an irritating tourguide jst for Dilandau's benefit. "Including some precious metals and boast a thriving community of metal workers somewhere in them thar hills. A good portion of its economy however comes from trade in furs. It has a wealth of animal life including dragons, some weird-looking fourlegged creatures, migratory birds, and lots and lots of fish in the river, a primary source of food during the summer months. Fanelia is also a good source for lumber, a renewable resource, from it's thick luch mountain forests."

"We're not tourists you know," Yukari called from up front. "So you can quit with the annoying tourguide bit."

"To your left you will see the famous..." I teased, deliberately hamming it up.

"Did Van tell you all of that?" Allen inquired.

"No," I said. "We never really discussed Fanelia while I was here. I just looked at the map Folken drew and thought about what the climate was like and made my own guess. There are places on earth that closely resemble Fanelia and that's what they tend to do there."

"Well you were right on all counts," Folken said. "It's a big country but it doesn't have a very large population so people tend to dismiss it out of hand."

We were currently rolling along eastbound on a dirt road that was just south of the hills that led up to the western mountains. To the south of us was open tundra and I could see the eastern mountains far off in the distance along the horizon line.

"Oooh!" I cried pointing excitedly off to the left where out of the window I spied a herd of funny yak-buffaloe looking critters ranging along the open lands. "Ooh! Look, look! Stop the car I want a picture!"

Amano sighed but gave in when Yukari started clamboring for one too. The rest (with the exception of Dilandau) got out to stetch thier legs and... have a pee in some cases. I noted that the air was a little cooler here and... a lot sweeter. Asturia had the ocean, Freid had the sweltering scent of the tropics, but in my mind nothing could beat the air in Fanelia. It smelt so clean and fresh! Scented with earth and the smell of growing forests as well as rain and ice mixed in with a variety of other natural woodsy smells made the air just the most wonderfully scented air anywhere.

"Nothing beats the air here!" I said sighing happily as I inhaled a deep lungful of its perfume. It was just somehow the best!

"If I could bottle it, I'd make a fortune," I said taking another deep breath. "On second thought, I'd probably keep it all to myself."

Folken chuckled.

Yukari found a flat rock with a nice veiw and suggested a picnic, a notion eagerly received all around, for I was hungry again. Geez, I was eating like a pregnant woman! Still, I wish I had known then that eating was all I had to do to keep from passing out so much.

It was a peaceful lunch, if you ignored the fact that Dilandau was shouting obscenities at us through most of it. We ignored him when he did so, reacting to it would only encourage him. Yeah, it was like that.

We were just about to climb back into the car and be on our way when suddenly my precient sense went crazy. Instead of being miles and miles away from us, I could sense the bit of Source Elemental almost right on top of us.

"Back in the truck!" I shouted. "It's comming!"

I didn't actually know what to expect really, I could only tell that the creature was approaching from the east and comming up fast upon us. Yukari and Celena headed for the safety of the SUV and I asked Amano to join them to keep an eye on Dilandau who was still tied up in the back seat.

The Source Elemental was certainly very intimidating in size alone, it was like an enormous snake with feathers and it stretched from nose to tail almost as long as half a soccer feild! I got a vision in just enough time to warn Allen and folken to take cover before it's Source Energist lit up and it belched forth a gaseuos cloud of greeny-colored ichor. The plant life int eh vicinity of the cloud instantly vaporized and even the stone melted a little. I stood up a little from where I crouched at a nearby rock and the Source Elemental shook it's head a little.

What the hell kind of Elemental had this once been?

I summoned up my powers and took a reading of the creature. It was the twisted form of an air Elemental that had once been used to purify air over the new manufactories before the toxicants could spread and pollute the environment. Now it's body was completly made of harmful chemicals. One weapon in its arsenal was some kind of acidic fog-breath. I already had a notion that I probably didn't want to find out what those spines along its back could do. My powers then told me that its blood had a high kill rate due to it's acidity; it could melt metal, stone and flesh with a single drop. The good thing about it was that, like a bat, the critter was completly blind and relied soley upon sonar and vibrations in the air to move about and tell it where it's prey was.

"Can you kill it?" I asked Allen.

"With what?" He demanded. "All I have on me is my sword and one swing into it's blood would melt the blade and kill me too."

"Good point," I said. "Folken, any ideas?"

The thing spat another cloud of gas at us, obviously trying very hard to get to us.

"Trapping it is out, Hitomi... could you perhaps use your powers to bind up its Foci and send it into a torpor like you did when you worked on Celena?"

"I can try," I said, reaching out with my powers and trying to begin the process of sealing the creature's foci so that it's meridians would freeze up. No good, I realized after a moment. The Source Elementals weren't normal. Despite thier physical bodies they had come from insubstantial creatures and they did not have meridians as I knew them.

It tried again to kill us with its deadly breath.

"No dice," I said. "I can't bind them up like a normal being of flesh because they simply aren't. We have to kill it's physical body first so that I can seal it away."

"This probably isn't the time to bring this up," Said Allen. "But why did we all of us come on a trip to hunt down dangerous elemental-beasts, and yet none of us thought to bring any kind of hunting equipment?"

"Eeergh," I said. Really, what could I say. Yes Allen, you're right and I'm completely lacking in common sense? Heh, fat chance, and besides, I didn't hear him making any suggestions at the time.

"It's blood is too acidic anyway," said Folken. "Physical weapons will just melt on contact so that leaves Miss Hitomi's special gifts."

"It is my quest anyway," I acknowledged. I didn't have to like it however. This putting my life in mortal danger idea was for the birds!

Wait a minute...

"Hey there's something I don't get," I said to Folken as we dodged another of that Source Elemental's attempts to fluch us out into the open. it was purposefully trying to get at us in particular...

"What's that?" Allen asked, throwing a rock at it.

"This critter has an ample source of food nearby in those yak-beasts on the tundra below us," I said. "SO why is it trying so hard just to get at us?"

"Maybe it doesn't eat yak-beast?" Allen suggested, lobbing another rock at the serpentine elemental.

It clicked. Elementals didn't consume physical food, they existed on the energy of the great meridians that flowed throughout this world! The whole reason they had twisted into their present form was because they needed the energy and the only source of food for them were the shatterd fragmnts of the Seal. Even though they had physical bodies now, they were still going to be hunting down the sources of energy they were most accustomed to.

So now what is that thing after? I wondered. Then it hit me...

Me, I realized. It's after me.

I had spent enough time within the SOurce crystal Ougura to still have some of that resonance. It could sense to vibration of the crystals song in the air around me! I probably felt like a walking snack to it.

"Stay here!" I commanded, leaping out from the megre protection offered by the rocks we were hiding behind.

"Oi!" I called, running at my fastest, off to one side. And when I set my mind to running fast, I can hit some pretty good speeds. Allen and Folken called for me to wait but I paid them no heed. I had a plan... sort of.

I reached within myself and drew on the energies in my foci, I couldn't afford to dip into my reserves this early in the game so I was going to have to see if I couldn't get some outside asistance. The creature, sensing it's true prey had at last come out of hiding, wasted no time in pursuing me. It tried to paralyze me with its chemical breath but I was using my mental pendant to steer myself out of it's way. The problm was that the critter was fast and manuverable. I was just barely keeping ahead of it while still trying to do what I was trying to do. Perhaps it would have been wiser of me to stay behind the rock.

But I can't call a water elemental up through stone without first calling upon and earth elemental and I don't have the energy to do both.

Though we were far away from the hot springs, I knew that the spings were still running under the ground. I stretched my powers downward to the springs and contacted one of the denizens there. It was a frail and sickly thing, nothing at all I knew from what it had been in its prime. Lack of the meridians was slowly killing it. Soon it would no longer have the strength to continue purifying its springs! I fed what power I had to offer down down though the soil and into the little water elemental. It perked right up and took my command, spiralling up around me at my summons.

"Go!" I pointed. It shot out in a geyser like water from a fireman's hose, speeding straight for the Source elemental. It's spirit strength was no match for the peice of Ougura Seal that the Source Elemental had absorbed into it but I wasn't worried about it's spirit strength. I needed my opponent physically beaten!

I looked back over my shoulder as there came a hissing sound and a great stench that hit me like a hot wind. I covered my mouth and closed my eyes, not daring to breathe any of it in. After a moment it disipated, leaving behind only the spirit-form of the elemental and a large chunk of Source stone. I reached out with my spiritual powers and sealed the Elemental away for good inside of the very same foci it had bonded itself to and as a further measure purified the energist with my own powers. No way was this thing going rogue again!

"Hitomi!" Allen cried, running towards me through the lingering mist that was the rapidly disipating remains of that source creature. "Hitomi! Are you alright?"

"Fine," I said, still coughing a little. I had after all, been right near ground zero when the two elementals had clashed.

"How in the world did you...?" Folken asked as I held the tiny pendant-sized energist stone aloft with a triumphant pump into the air. I looked pardonably pleased with myself.

"Physical weapons wouldn't work on this particular Source Elemental," I said. "Because of its high toxicity and acid content, it melted everything that touched it. I needed a weapon it couldn't fight. Water, I learned in science class, is often called the universal solvent. Most things will dissolve in water. I took a gamble that most of this things chemicals would either disolve, bond with the water molecules to make it harmless, or simply become so diluted as to be useless."

"Looks like you won that gamble," Folken said. "Nice thinking Hitomi."

"Thanks," I said. I took a deep breath and we started back to the SUV where Yukari and the others were waiting. As much as I wanted to give it a rest, I could sense another elemental a few miles away to the north near Adom Village.

"There's another one near Adom, we should take care of it before it has a chance to hurt anyone if it hasn't already."

And so we started out again.

I don't know when the last time i updated this was... A long time ago that's all I know. So anyway, if anyone's still following this and thinking "No Van... Still no Van... Where's the Van gone?!" He should be making his grand appearance in about another two chapters, provided I ever remember to update. Nightheart has had them written forever and a day, but never remembers to post them.


	13. Chapter 13

The sun had just about set and it was getting dark when we neared Adom Village, a small lumber and fur-trading town inhabited almost entirely by native "halflings"... I guess that what they could be called. They were those half-human half-animal people that only existed here on Gaea. I couldn't call them catgirls and dogboys and fishwives because they were all different types this time. So I tried a neutral word, the could tell just by looking at me that I was foreign (even if they didn't know how foreign I really was) so they'd probably make allowances for my ignorance.

The architecture of the buildings in the little village was interesting. The huts were all round with grass-thatch roofs shaped half way between a dome and a cone, a hole in the center of the roof showed that they heated their houses with some kind of fireplace. From the outside it looked like the little round huts had two floors for there was a raised porch exactly halfway from the eaves of the roof to the ground. The bottom half under the round little open porch was grey stone that had been mortared together and the top half above the porchline was wood-log sealed with... something, clay perhaps? I didn't know. Hung over the railings where the decks weren't actually left open were brightly (very brightly) colored blankets done in stylized patterns of animals that I could only describe as "tribal."

From what I could see, it looked to me that instead of that actual house, the decks on the outside of the house were where life actually happened in the village for I could see halflings of all ages engaged in a variety of tasks in the wooden decks outside their houses, some were cleaning fish or vegetables, others were engaged in some kind of craft (and there were a good many crafts to be seen) while others chatted idly smoking on long wooden pipes.

The Village elder, a thin, spry old dog-man named Nukushi, welcomed me and my party and our strange carriage. They didn't have an inn, but the elder's house had been built with extra rooms to serve much the same purpose. Folken probably would have gone off on a long tangent about the cultural reasons behind it but Dilandau chose this time to make a break for it. Silly man, he should have known he wouldn't get far before Celena shouted her

"Bad Dilandau! Heel!" And he was brought up short by the choke chain again. Some people never learn. Still, it did pose the question of what we were to do with him precisely, both right now and in the future. For the time being... well, we all had to sleep sometime and Celena was the only one with any real power over him. Allen and Folken, both of them feeling some kind of warped responsibility for the guy (heavens only knew why) agreed that they would trade off fshifts and keep watch over him for the night to make certain he didn't escape. Well, if they wanted to play jailor...

While they were deciding on the best way to tie him up for the night I met in council with Nukushi and several of his best hunters, three of which had been seriously injured by the Source Elemental that I had come to destroy. They each gave me all the information they had, but unfortunately it wasn't much. From what I could gather, they said it was as if the forest around them had suddenly come alive. Never before had they ever encountered such an unusual occurance in the forest and it had them all very worried (which was male-eese for "scared shitless") so I tried to get a more accurate reading of what I was going to be facing in the morning when i went out to meet the creature.

I searched out with my mind and with my powers. I could sense the Source Energist nearby but it was like most of its power had been hidden behind a barrier of some kind and I couldn't get much more than the vague sense of presence hanging about. The last Source Elemental I had faced had been easy to read even from a large distance away, its energy signature had been clear and I hadn't had any troubles at all finding it and tracking it down. I couldn't imagine what might be blocking my abilities to detect it. It looked like I was simply going to have to rely on my Second Sight to guide me.

The hunters expressed a concern that they had had for several days... they feared very much that the Source Elemental might grow tired of hanging about in the forest and come down into the village to feed. Suddenly my staying there seemed like a dangerous imposition on the villagers; if, like the last one I'd faced earlier, this Source Elemental could sense my connection with the Ougura Seal. It would indeed come down to the village hunt, drawn by the scent of power coming off from me, and the innocent might suffer. Still, I had learned how to erect a spirit barrier, there was no reason why I could not put the little village under such a protection. I could even use the abundant energy supplies from the Source Energist shard I had just aquired earlier that day.

I went to the enormous stone totem pole they had in the center of the village with the tribe's totem animal on it and closed my eyes to concentrate. The curious, I could sense, were peeking out from inside thier homes or watching me obliquely from the corner of their eyes from where they sat in the cool evening air smoking from pipes or doing some sewing. I created a barrier sphere in my mind centered around the pebble of energist I held in my hand and then build another one on top of it, followed by another and another, layers and layers of protection like a cocoon. I wove them together with a cord of energy and sunk that cord into the energist in my hand.

Tapping into the vast, wild and untamed power housed within the tiny energist stone felt a lot like drinking lightning; I gasped in surprise and no small amount of pain as I sent the power singing through my meridians in order to respond to my will. Even with all of my concentration keeping the raw, wild power in line, it still stung quite a bit. I directed the abundant store of power within the energist to flow out into the shields and I set them expanding. It was rather a lot like carefully blowing on a soap bubble from a wand only instead of the walls of the soap bubble getting weaker the bigger it got they stayed exactly the same strength and consistency. When the barrier reached to the very edge of the village I set it there firmly and released my attention.

Perhaps someday I'll be able to do all of this without hardly having to think about it, I thought. As it stood, I was still tired from my battle earlier that day and erecting the spirit barrier using the Source Energist. I wanted some food and a rest. I got both from the grateful Village Elders.

"Lady Hitomi?" a deferential voice squeaked near my ear. "Lady Hitomi?"

I grumbled a little and pulled the blankets over my head. My slitted eyes told me that it was just barely dawn and I had no business being up that early!

"Hey! Woman!" an obnoxious voice called from off to one side. "Get your fat lazy ass out of bed!"

I was not a morning person and he had just roused the she-dragon from her cave. Rar! I sent an annoyed little burst of power at him in pique and rolled over on my other side, away from the sunlight.

"Ow!" Dilandau yelled, just to piss me off I was sure. "Little bitch!"

Rrrrrr...

I mentaly debated the emotional satisfaction I might get from blasting him into dust right there but decided that it wasn't worth the effort it would take me to conjure up enough power to do it. I still had a battle to fight later that day anyway.

"Oh Celena..." I called. "Will you shut the little lab rat up please before I do it permanently?"

"Bad Dilandau! Heel!" she said. There was a buzzing noise this time instead of just the usual choking sound. It looked like she was learning. Too bad that electro-shock therapy hadn't proven effective in curing antisocial personality disorder. Dilandau just didn't see that his behavior was wrong dispite the fact that he was a remorseless manipulator who took pleasure in wanton destruction of property and loss of life.

I shook my head a little at that. Just what were we going to do with him? Killing someone because they were mentally ill was wrong and I didn't know if they even had a mental instability plea here on Gaea or even a mental institution for that matter. Most of me just wanted to wash my hands of the matter but like it or not I was involved from first to last.

I sighed and wondered if I might be able to get back to sleep now. Not likely, I was already up and thinking and once my mind started functioning there was no drifting back into that pleasant haze that would allow me to sleep again. I had a lot to think of anyway. I had another Source Elemental to seek out and seal away today. Some kind of weapon might prove useful against this thing, but then again it might not; the last one we had fought had been beaten mostly due to luck and my own quick thinking. Who knew if I might be able to figure out the key to defeating this one in time to kill whatever physical body it had made for itself in time to stop it. Still, going in there completely unarmed seemed pretty stupid to me.

"Coffee..." I begged. It was my life's-blood, I absolutely could not function without it. I had to be awake and alert in order to plan for this next thing.

Yukari took pity on me and brewed me a cup using the coffee tea-bags I'd brought with me. Cream and sugar, were of course, a must. Ah...

We settled in to breakfast, I was eating an insane amount as was becoming normal for me. Me Allen and Folken were discussing the nexxt Source Elemental we were going to hut that day. I told them what little I knew about it, including my puzzlement at not being able to sense it and concluded with

"There is one major thing that gets me about the Source Elementals. Varie-sama said that they live on the abundant energy supplies in this worlds meridians and the reason they merged with those fragments of the Seals was that they needed the energy. So now, what? Given the fact that all of the energy here on Gaea is still soup..."

"I see what you're getting at," said Folken. "You think that now that thier original suorce of nutrients has dissipated into a form they can no longer use, that they are seeking other ways of gathering the energy they crave."

"Yes exactly," I said, releived he'd put the thing I'd been wrestling with in my sleep into words. "That first Source Elemental we dealth with yesterday came to us because it could sense my resonance with Ougura, which will fade over time. I'm wondering what method of energy collection this new Source Elemental has devised for itself."

"Here's a question," said Allen. "If these Source Elementals are really after abundant supplies of energy then why do they not simply try to take out the Draconian Enclaves and get those seal-crystals? They have large chunks of them in thier bodies already that make them stronger, surely they must have known that getting access to the seal energist would give them all the energy they could ever want."

"I beleive they would have tried it by now," I said. "Except that they know somehow that if they try it the High Preists that guard the seals will bind them up inside like they did all of the others who were near enough to heed thier call. I think they're trying to become stronger before they take on the Draconians for the seal energists. I've no doubt that the Draconian Enclaves will eventually become a target."

"And what of this village?" asked Folken. "As a boy I spent quite some time here and I would be saddened if anything were to happen to it or the people in it."

"My barrier will protect this village," I assured him. "It's anchored in that energist I placed beside the totem pole."

"That reminds me," said Allen. "Why has no-one recognized thier prince Folken just yet? It seems rather odd in a village this small, that if his highness has spent time here as a boy they would not easily recognize him as a man."

"That's me, I'm afraid," I said owning up to it. "I placed a sort of empathy ward on him. People who know him will look at him and see someone they vaguely recognize but will dismiss out of hand; sort of like "oh yes, I've seen that guy before" and go about their business. In thier minds they'll see him as belonging there somehow and will forget about him two minutes later."

"WHy would you do that?" Allen asked.

"I don't want to be seen just yet," Folken said. "Not until I have had the chance to meet with my brother first."

"Folken, you don't have to stay here with us," I said. "If you wanted, you could fly over to Fanelia City and meet with him."

"And tell Van that I left you to face mortal peril alone?" Folken asked, arching a brow. "I think not. Van would not forgive me for it."

"And what am I? Chopped fish?" Asked Allen, looking wounded. "She's hardly alone, you know."

"In a delicate stage such as this, that might be just as bad," I muttered, hoping he'd catch my meaning. Van and I were in love with one another, but that didn't automatically mean that he wouldn't get jealous if he'd heard I was spending all of this time alone with Allen when I could have come straight to him. He'd cool off later about it, but it wouldn't be a good start and I'd just as soon avoid it if I could. Allen, no fool, nodded wisely and said

"Well then Folken, we'll be glad to have your mind and blade in the upcoming fight."

"Speaking of fights," I said. "Back to the matter at hand. I need to have some kind of weapon this time around. I don't want to be caught unprepared like the last time. I have my Second Sight and the other powers that come with it but that doesn't help me when I need to kill the Source Elemental's physical bodies first before I can seal away thier spirits. Not all of these beasts can be melted in water like the last one was."

"How about a sword?" Allen suggested. "I have an extra that I could loan you."

"No good, I don't know how to use one and don't have the time to learn," I said.

"A bow?" Folken suggested. "It's a long range weapon, you wouldn't even have to get close to the creature in order to take it out."

"Same problem," I said. "Besides, if I go into a fight with a weapon I want to be certain that it's something I can trust and feel comfortable with."

"What about using the same thing you defeated the last Elemental beast with?" Folken suggested. "If your spiritual powers cannot immediately touch their physical bodies, and the creatures have no meridians for you to control, then it looks like you will have to have a weapon that can defeat them on their own plane."

"You mean fight fire with fire?" I asked. "Command an Elemental of my own to attack the Source Elementals?"

I thought about it. It was a good idea, a little sad perhaps that the nature spirits would be fighting thier own kind but that was the way it went sometimes. The problem was that, due to lack of the great meridians in this world, all of the elementals that had not taken up residence within the great seals in order to preserve their existances were all very weak from lack of the vital force that kept them "alive". If I enlisted the aid of one of these elementals to fight against a warped Source Elemental with a peice of the seal energists fueling its body and powers, it would be like sending a mouse to fight a lion. The Source Elemental would likely have it woefully outclassed. I explained as much to my comrades.

"Can't you use your own spirit powers to make your own Elemental more powerful?" Allen questioned.

"I don't have that much energy to spare," I said. "I could bolster it just enough to attack like I did yesterday, but it would only be good for one use and I could only command the Elemental once. If I don't kill the Source Elemental in that one attack it will easily be able to kill me in my own weakened state."

"It sounds like you need one you can use over and over," Allen said.

"What about the air Elemental inside that peice of Source Energist you won yesterday," Folken said. "You said that you purified it... whatever that means."

"In and of itself the seal energists that the Draconians commune with are neither good not evil," I explained. "But like any tool can be used for both; you can build a house with a hammer or use it to crush someone skull. But when Ougura and the other seal energists absorbed the power of the meridians that had been warped and dispersed by Dornkirks ZOne of Absolute Fortune they also absorbed all of the negative emotions tainting the world at that time."

"I recall the battle," Allen said. "Suddenly nothing mattered to anyone but greed and conquest."

"Precisely, all of those emotions were absorbed into the seven seals and when the Draconians tried to purify them in thier holy springs, or whatever it is that the six other Enclaves use, and reestablish the meridians in thier proper places the energists, waped by all of that negativity exploded. The Draconians managed to call back and gather up most of the other fragments but a few merged with Elementals and you know the rest. The source Elementals are still warped by that negativity and it had twisted them into something they would not ordinarily be. What I did was purge out that negativity from the stone and the Elemental was returned to its natural state."

"I see," said Folken. "And will you do this for every stone?"

"Yes," I said. "it seems I will have to. In order to return the seals and remake the meridians the seals must be pure once more. If i re-introduce a negative Source energist into the pot who knows what will happen? But we're getting off track again. I'm wondering what precisely it is about this area that has attracted the SOurce Elemental to it. There must be some kind of source of energy nearby."

"We could aske Elder Nukushi," Folken said. "If anyone knows these woods, it's him."

"Sounds like a good idea," I said. I went to seek out the Elder and found him in conversation with one of the Adom's foresters, discussing something he had run across this morning. I arrived just about at the beginning of it and waited respectfully for the man to conclude his business. Nukushi signalled me over however.

"This concerns you and your quest I believe," he said. "You should hear this as well. Go on, Telth, continue your tale."

"Yes Elder," he said. "As I said, I was tracking down my second-eldest cub, the young lad always seems to get into more trouble than all of the rest combined and I thought that he might had strayed into the ruins even though, like all of the other children I had expressly forbidden him to."

"Which would only make him more detirmined to do it," I said. "He sounds like my little brother."

"Just as you say miss," the forester said jovially, but then turned serious as he continued. "I neared the old ruins in the forest and as I got closer, I discovered that the forest had changed dramatically."

"I what way?" I asked.

"The trees, the vegetation," he said. "They were like nothing I had ever seen before. It was like... I can hardly begin to explain it. The ruins have always been a little overgrown by the forest but now you can hardly tell that there are any ruins at all. It is covered on ever surface with an indredibly thick dense moss. It's a moss the like of which I have never seen before. It's thick and greenich-black with strange blossoms growing out of it. The air around it smells cloying-sweet, like something that touches just at the edge of your memory and makes you want more. I was suspicious of it so I got right out of there."

"I believe you were wise to do so, Telth," Nukushi said.

Why was it attracted to those ruins, was whatever was in there sheilding the Source Energist from my detection?

"These ruins you speak of," I said. "Do you know what they are ruins of?"

"Yes miss," Telth said. "They're the remnants of an ancient Draconian temple-city. A cursed place."

I restrained a snort at that, perhaps now it was cursed but i'll bet that in the past it had been no more cursed than the people who had once lived there. But that was aside of the point. I'd be willing to bet good money that there was some residual power or something left behind tht gave off energy for the Souce Energist to be so attracted to it. Perhaps some ancient Draconian artifact, like one of their wishing pendants.

"Do you know if there are any ancient artifacts left behind inside the temple?" I asked.

"No way of knowing missus," Telth said. "Those Draconians had ways of keeping people out when they didn't want them in. There's a barrier around the main temple. No-one's been inside for hundreds of years."

"I see," I said. "Well thank you very much for your time and your information Mister Telth." I bowed.

I now had a pretty good iadea of what had attracted the Source Elemental to this spot, now I had to figure out what to do with it and how. First, a notion about a weapon to carry with me into battle had occured to me, but I was going to need that peice of the Ougura energist I had captured in order to try it out.

I sat in the lotus position in front of the center totem pole in the village with a smaller barrier sheild around me. Ougura had cautioned me to always have a sheild, or better yet several sheilds, in place around me when I began a working to protect myself and more importantly to protect the people around me.

The air Elemental that was nestled inside the little energist had been purified and returned to its original state. In my Sight the little creature's natural form was actually kind of cute; it looked like a glowing transluscent cross between an enormous peacock with no legs and a sinewy snake. Instead of having two wings, it had four, one set behind the other thought they didn't resemble wings so much as those long, gracefull translucent fins you see on some exotic fish. It flowed through the air with its ephemeral feathers and wings swaying gently in an invisible breeze. It's little cute little snout and enormous gas-flame-blue eyes were so endearing. And it was so affectionate when I let it out, it came up and nuzzled at me like a pet ferret. Since I was usuing the energist in other ways the critter had shrunk back down from its former enormous proportions to its true size of... well about the size of a peacock.

I wondered what I was supposed to do with it. The little air Elemental's original purpose had been to purify the air from harmful chemical products released by one of the factories in either Zaibach or Basram. I couldn't see how air purification was going to do me any good. Air didn't seem like a useful element to have in a fight. It just didn't seem to have any teeth, aside of tornadoes and hurricanes there wasn't much damage you could do with wind. I didn't want tornadoes or hurricanes because they left an awful lot of property damage behind in thier wake. I wanted a weapon that was a little more low key. Weapon... Suddenly my mind flashed to compressed air. There were compressed air rifles, I knew. They weren't as powerful as rifles that used gunpowder but they could still do damage. If i were going up a physical opponent I wanted a weapon that would do damage in the real world.

I nicknamed the little air elemental Queenie because she looked like a little queen peacock. I knew that she had once been used to purify air and that her mutated form had taken on all of the harmful chemicals she had once gotten rid of. Perhaps there would be something useful there, like a gaseous cloud or some kind of cleansing wind.

I had several blank placards spread out in front of me, each with a tiny ore-energist pyrite crystal embedded in the top of it ready and waiting to receive the commands I was going to imprint into it. Like buring a CD, I could "write" a sort of pre-recorded use into a blank pyrite crystal with my own spiritual energy to be activated at a later time. The cards that were attached to the tiny pyrite crystals were to remind me of what exactly I'd written onto which pyrite crystal.

I entered a very light trance in order to more fully concentrate my energies on the task ahead and called to the Elemental to lend me her power.

Queenie obligingly released a spray of noxious chemicals to be channeled through my spiritual energy and written into the pyrites, then she conjured up a strong wind spiral or two that felt somehow unusually clean and pure, an a chocking cloud of some kind of mustard gas before she was all tapped out and had to return to her nest inside her energist to recover. I painted the kanji for pesticide on seven of the placards, purify on four of them, choking fog on another two, and the kanji for wind on the three I had left.

To my mind, it was a good solution to the problem of not having a weapon to battle with. I was most accustomed to relying on my powers by now but facing severe energy drain and loss of consciousness was not a valid option in the fight ahead. Storing up a kind of energy to use at a later time was a most sensible way to solve the problem and I could concentrate all of my power on sealing up and purifying the source energist.

Preparations had taken up most of the day by that point, and it was late afternoon by the time I was finally ready. I was willing to leave right away in hopes of getting the battle over with quickly but Allen wouldn't hear of me leaving for the forest when the sun was westering and risk getting caught in unfamiliar terrain after dark. I argued that I could simply dowse my way back to the village but in the end I had to conceded that he made sense. If it was dark and I couldn't use my othersight to see after the battle then I'd be up ships creek until morning. He was seconded by Amano, Folken, Celena and Yukari. I was clearly out voted.

Nukushi offered his hospitality for another night in addition to a guide in the morning to take me to where they believed the creature laired. I thanked him and hoped we weren't to much of an imposition to which his wife replied that they'd be willing to put up with a great deal more just to be rid of the monster. The wives of the village were afraid to let their children out of doors.

I wandered around the little vilage and tried to get to know people a little better. The folk of Adom were surprisingly open and friendly. I discovered that aside of being a lumber and fur-trading town, Adom also did a lot in the way of crafts.

Women and men proudly displayed thier wares on the wrap-around decks outside of their homes, and were more than happy to discuss their work with a curious and appreciative outsider. Thier work was deeply rooted in their culture and animals were featured very prominently. I was enchanted by the inticacy of thier art-style and got a good many pictures for there was very little that was left undecorated I noticed, now that I had gotten a chance to look around.

The artwork in Adom favored complex geometric patterns in interlocking circles, curvatures, and points that started out as one thing and gradually seemed to evolve its way into something else before going back. The way they wove the geometrics together reminded me strongly of some of the Celtic knotwork I'd seen but the flavor of it was altogether different. They didn't use many hard, straight lines, but instead curved them inward or outward slightly. Thier triangles and squares had very sharp points because the lines were curved. And where they didn't use geometrics in intricate patterns they liked to use highly stylized animals. You could tell if it was a "bird" or a "fish" but there the resemblance ended. They filled in the shapes with thier colorful geometrics.

I watched for the better part of an hour as two women, sisters I believed, sat side by side outside their hut; one weaving on a basket with an intricate radial pattern in dyed grasses along the bottom and outside and the other weaving a blanket on a loom. The blanket wasn't wool, like I had been expecting but rather, she explained came from the winter coat of those giant yak-buffalo-looking beasts. They grew long, smooth, shaggy coats in the winter which the village graciously relieved them of when the weather got warm. I noted that some of the blankets which I had taken to be woven fabric were actually made of fur! They had taken tufts of animal fur, dyed them different colors and sewn then onto a treated skin in the patterns that Adom favored.

There were more wares than just weaving, I noted. Pottery was also quite prevalent, there was a clay deposit that colored the nearby river grey and several huts displayed pots with colorful glazes in patterns that I would have called "tribal." There were stone and wood carvers too and their works were very pretty, detailed in the knotwork-geometrics that Adom had perfected, figureines of animals were what generally stone was carved as. The stone and woods were polished, by hand, into smooth finishes and wood carvers rubbed different kinds of oils into their peices to give them different colors or bring out the natural grains in the wood. Inlay wasn't as popular in Adom as finding the natural beauty and quality in a particular peice of raw material and enhancing it with work and a fine eye. When I compared the artwork carved in Adom with the factory-line souveniers found in most other places I couldn't help but sigh a little and think that they sure didn't make them like they used to.

Artwork didn't stop and blankets, baskets, pottery and furniture either and my fashionista clothes-horse feminine self absolutely craved a closer look at a lot of the clothing they were wearing. I was luckily approached very shyly by a wolf-girl about my own age who was just as curious about the clothing and jewelry that I had put on for that day. Ah! Cultural similarities! I spun around to let her see my clothing in greater detail and she returned the favor. It turned out that they made most of hteir clothing by hand during the long winter moths, but there were some ready made clothes and jewelry that she personally had made to sell. I went over to her hut, eagre to see.

The necklaces and bracelets were lovely! In Fanelia, the natural jade was of the dark pine-green variety rather than the milky greens, pinks, and yellows found in Freid. It turned out that garnets were another stone they worked with. More to the point were the metals they used to place them. Gold wasn't as prized on Gaea as it was on Earth, it was still valued for its non-oxidizing property but on Gaea another metal was the standard the used to measure value as we used gold on Earth; something called star-metal. Gold and some silver, copper was used a lot for they had some way of treating it that kept it from turning green with oxidation. They liked to have copper to bring out the deep green of the jade and it looked lovely together. I practically drooled over a belt of copper plates in cut-out geometrics with flat-faced jade centers cut in the shape of a dragon. It would match this one shirt I had bought recently to perfection.

Most of the clothes she made, unfortunately were nothing I would wear on a fairly regular basis, pants and skirts made of hide with the fur left on it, but there was one that caught my attention; not for myself but for someone else. It was a vest of brown leather, sleeveless to be worn over the tunics favored in Fanelia. From the shoulders down to mid-breast was a panel made of some kind of hide I'd never seen before. Klekla (the wolf-girl) said it was of a small dragon critter about the size of a goat that breathed fire and was just big enough to be a nuisance tot he village. Her brothers had hunt it down last fall because it had taken to sniffing around the yak-beast pens hoping to get a free meal. The hide was reddish brown with a golden sheen when the light hit it, like someone had dusted it with minute particles of gold. Where the top and bottom panels of the vest met was a wide band of embroidery roughtl two inches wide featuring geometricized dragons intertwined in the intricate patterns that village did. Hanging down from the embroidery was a fringe four inches long. Each fringe was braided knotwork of tiny leather cords ending with a bead of garnet. The back panel of the shirt featured a large blown up pattern of the knotwork dragons that were repeated in the leather-buns along the hems and embroidery of the vest. There was a matching belt of leather braided with draci hide and garnet beads to secure it closed. It would look perfect on him.

I had to buy it. I had some Gaea currency still from all the gifts that Chid and his council had given me and we set to bargaining with a will. both me and Kekla were experience hagglers so it was more for the fun of it than it was to skimp on every penny. In the end, I could let it go at a generous surplus for her, because I genuinely liked the girl and admired her work. I was willing to pay top dollar for something of high quality and good workmanship. I honestly couldn't imagine actually having to sew and make something like this all by hand! We were joined by Yukari who saw the belt I'd just made off with and absolutely had to buy something as well. As it turned out, the girl making fur skirts in tufted patterns wasn't a total loss because Yukari would _so _wear something like that.

After our shopping beast had been fed we girls sat on the deck outside her house chatting away about this and that while the sun set. And the topic of the vest came back up again.

"It's obviously a man's vest Hitomi," Yukari said. "So why did you buy it?"

"It'll look good on someone I know," I evaded. "And it'll be just the right size for him I think."

"Oh a 'him' is it?" Yukari teased, seeing the look on my face. I should have known she'd zero in on it.

"Is it for one of the men in your party?" Klekla asked curiously. "Not the blonde one surely, the colors are all wrong for him."

"No it's not for him. I've done him and his family all of the favors I'm going to do for a while I think. No, it's for someone else." I'd hoped that would be the end of it... but no...

"I see," Yukari said with a sly teasing look. "I'll bet it's for Van, isn't it?"

My face flushed a little, I couldn't help it, but I managed to say with admirable eveness in my voice

"Well, yes, if you must know. Last I knew all he ever wore was this red tunic... granted, it looks very good with his coloring but a girl doesn't always want to see her guy dressed like a mechanic. He needs help. I figure a gentle nudge in the right direction. Besides, if he's going to be in the public eye he should at least dress the part."

"He's one of those that like to be "comfortable" eh?" Klekla asked in feminine sympathy. "I know how you feel. You should have seen my husband a year after we were married. I thought I had married a sharp dresser, but no. He would have been happy wearing nothing but the same tunic and trews day after day. The lengths I had to go to to get him dressed..."

"I thought you were our same age," I said in surprise.

"I've seventeen summers," Klekla said.

"Wow," said Yukari. "How long have you and your husband been married?"

"Two years this midsummer," she replied cheerfully. "He's a fine catch if I do say so. A little rough around the edges but he's got a good heart. And what of yours?"

"Huh?" I said. "Oh! No, neither of us are married." I said blushing a little at the idea. I was only seventeen, and yet it seemed that on this world marrying young was the norm rather than the exception.

"Although I am recently engaged," Yukari added. "We've been seeing each other for as long as you and your husband have been married."

"Are you not with one of the men of your party?" Klekla asked me curiously.

"No," I said bluntly, shrugging it off. "Allen is the brother of the pale-haired girl I said I'd help with my spiritual powers and... the other guy, the quiet one, is... well..."

"Not interested?" Klekla guessed sympathetically.

"No! nononononono," said hurriedly. "It's not like _that_. He's actually related to someone..."

"The one you bought the vest for?" Klekla surmised, noddng wisely. "I understand now, he's escorting you to your betrothal then!"

Yukari laughed gleefully and poked at me in a teasing manner. While I blushed and stammered and tried to come up with a response for that that wouldn't get me deeper in cultural misunderstandings. Finally I just let it go. With any luck, Van was a popular name like George or Henry in England.

It was the crack of dawn again and I could not imagine why I was getting out of bed again. This had made two mornings in a row that I had been awakened this early and I was beginning to worry that my supply of coffee wouldn't hold out.

Yukari, Celena and Amano were still asleep while me Allen and Folken, dressed for the fight, ate a quiet, somber breakfast and checked our respective weapons one last time. The sun was a handspan over the horizon when we set out though the chill morning mists, escorted by our wolf-man forester guide. An hours traipse through the wood took us to the ruins and the mutated forest surrounding it.

"Let's go," I said, trying to put on a brave front despite my churning stomach. It was one thing to be surprised by danger or to rush headlong into danger to save someone else's life, it was another kettle of fish altogether to knowingly seek it out of your own accord and walk straight into it.

We saw the strange moss covering every surface with thorny spines topped with large red and white blossoms sticking out everywhere we could see. I still couldn't seem to sense where the Source Energist was precisely, only that it was nearby. I tried looking with my othersight but the entire area was covered in a strange miasma. I couldn't tell what from where.

"Do you see it yet?" Allen asked.

"No," I said. "It's here, but that's all I know."

"Have your powers told you what the SOurce Elemental looks like yet?" Folken asked.

"No, just that it's here," I said. I couldn't even seem to summon up a vision of the Source Elemental, whatever was sheilding it from my Sight was doing a very good job.

I tried another tactic and closed my eyes, summoning up the mental image of my pendant, circling in my mind. It took longer than usual but at last pulled directly to the front.

"It's to the front of us," I said.

"Well, that tells us what direction we might find it," Folken said. "But it does not tell us how near or far."

"Everybody be on your guard," Allen said, drawing his sword so that it would be ready. "We don't know when it might attack."

My stomach tightened even more than it already had been; I really did not like being in mortal danger, I liked even less the idea of walking into what was probably a trap. My nose detected that strange cloying smell the forester had spoken of; it was almost familiar somehow, like a dream or a faded memory. I sniffed a little, trying to detect where the strange scent was coming from. I vaguely noted that Allen and Folken were doing the same to either side of me.

"Strange," said Allen. "I could swear that I can smell my mother's favorite flower."

"Flowers?" said Folken. "I smell the scent of the great tree that grows behind the palace. My brother and I used to climb it when we were young together."

"I smell a rat," I said suspiciously. The air smelled like Fanelia to me, of ice and wind and forest.

"A rat?" Allen said in surprise.

"It means that somethings fishy," I explained and then realized that it probably hadn't made things any clearer to him. "Something's suspicious," I clarified.

That scent was intensifying and I found my unease being strangely soothed. I felt so relaxed now, surely there was nothing wrong here. I could just sit down for a minute and rest. I was a little tired from the walk through the woods, a quick rest for my feet would do me good.

"Hitomi?" Folken asked quietly. "What are you doing?"

I yawned a bit, I had been up pretty early this morning; resting my eyes wouldn't hurt either. SOmething nudged at me out of the corner of my mind, but I couldn't seem to gather up the energy to care. It was so nice and peaceful here. I let my eyes drift closed only to be rudely nudged by the toe of a boot.

"Hey!" Allen said. "This isn't the time for sleeping Hitomi."

I blinked owlishly up at him. Couldn't he see I was trying to sleep here? I grumbled a bit and tried to find a more comfortable position.

Allen turned to Folken.

"Do you feel tired too?"

"Yes. And you?" Folken said.

"The same."

"There are some predatory animals that have the power to send out an empathic wave that lulls thier prey to sleep," Folken mused. "Whatever Source Elemental we're facing seems to have the same kind of ability. I would suggest that we find a way to wake Hitomi and keep her alert."

By now I was just starting to drift off at last and htier voices were fading to a buzz when I was rudely splashed with ice-cold water. I woke with an outraged and shocked gasp.

"On your feet," Allen said pitilessly, grabbing me by the upper arm and yanking hard upwards. Despite that I could already eel my limbs turing to rubber as I tried once more to drift off into slumber. But then something inside of me knew it wasn't right, it was early in the morning but I had been up for a while and I'd had my coffee; I shouldn't be this tired right now. Sluggishly I pulled out one of my cards and gave the crystal a little nudge with my powers to activate it.

Suddenly from up out of nowhere a strong breeze kicked up, blowing past us in another direction taking that strange scent with it. Oops, I'd grabbed the wrong card by mistake; my senses were so befuddled by sleep that I'd grabbed one of my wind cards instead of the extra energy storage pyrite I'd meant to grab to bolster my strength. Suddenly my head cleared. I was no longer sleepy.

"It's something in the air," Allen surmised. "How did you know?"

"I didn't," I said. "I grabbed the wrong card."

"Lucky," Folken said. "I was starting to succumb to the sleep as well."

"It's back again," Allen noted, sniffing the air.

"That was fast," I said.

"Another wind card?" Allen suggested.

"I only have a few, I don't want to use them all up," I replied. "Besides, it will only return a few minutes later. We'll have to hurry and find the source."

Allen, Folken and I moved forward. Once we stepped onto the moss I blinked in surprise, one of the flowers on the moss suddenly burst into the sky like a bird startled from a bush. I grabbed the camera around my neck and nudged at another plant to see if it would do the same thing. It did and I snapped an action shot. Flying plants! No-one would believe me without the picture.

Suddenly the area around us exploded into life. What we had taken to be red and white flowers were actually something else. They looked like flowers, only the petals flapped like a birds wings and instead of a beak the root-end of the plant ended in a long wicked-looking thorn. I looked again as one humbingbird-like thing flittered past us, striking and diving. It was like being attacked by a swarm of bees, we were in the midst of a swirling tempest of red and white. The creatures were coming at us from every direction. Folken and Allen were swinging away with thier swords, trying to cut down the swarm, but to no avail.

"Hitomi!" Folken called. "Summon another wind to drive them away!" I nodded.

"Twister!" I shouted, activating another card. A wind powerful enough to knock all of us to the ground kicked up around us seizing the little flower-beasts in an implacable grip and swirling away with them. In a moment, all was still.

"Whew!" Allen said, looking around him at the silence of the forest. "That was close."

"We still haven't found the Source Energist," Folken reminded him. "So it's not over yet."

"A swarm of carnivorous plants?" I said, shaking my head in disbelief. "Not only that, but carnivorous plants that can fly? I'm glad I got a picture, nobody would believe it if I told them without proof."

"Hey," Allen said seriously. "Come over here and look at this."

Folken and I both proceeded over to where Allen stood over a mound of some sort. The black moss was churning over some bones and Folken sadly recognized them as belonging to one of the villagers.

"That moss is moving," Allen said. "I don't know what it looks like to you, but it seems to me that it's helping the body to decompose."

I looked at it with my othersight and confirmed that the physical meridians were being devoured by the black moss.

"It looks like those flying carnivorous flowers aren't the only thing we have to worry about," I said. We then got yet another surprise... the black moss that had formerly been covering every surface begant to disappear even from beneath us, like water being soaked into a sponge. It was all disappearing in one direction too. Towards the ruins.

"Shall we follow?" Folken questioned dryly. As the darkness receded into the distance.

"Do we have any choice?" Allen countered, just as dry.

"This is the part, in all of the action movies, when the huge bad-guy comes out and starts ass-beating on the good guys," I observed.

"Well, let's go get our ass beating," Allen said, testing his sword again and preparing for a fight.

I sighed and followed the two men. We were met at the edge of the city by about twenty plant-constructs. They were nothing more than crude shapes of moss and leaves animated by crude energy, weilding clubs. With his usual elegance, Allen easily accounted for seven of them without breaking a sweat, all he had to do was slash them apart with his word. Folken battled with another six with his own blade, leaving me to be attacked by the rest. Wind would not take care of these fellows, that was for certain. I debated running away, but didn't know the area very well and I still had a Source Elemental to deal with.

This Elemental was still a plant and I had some weed killer on me!

"Pesticide," I said, activating a the appropriate card. A stream of toxic chemicals poured over the remaining four or five plant golems, making them shrivel up and die.

"Well done," Folken congratulated me.

"Thank-you," I said. "You did well yourself."

"You were definately instructed by Balgus," Allen said, shaking Folken's hand. "You have his mark about you."

"Thank-you, I'm flattered," Folken said. "I believe you accounted for the most in this run."

"Unfortunately, there's probably plenty more where those cam from," Allen replied. Then he ruined the manly comraderie of the moment by walking smack into the barrier feild. I know that he couldn't see it like I could, but I couldn't help it, I laughed.

I spun some energy from my meridians out around us to create a barrier sheild and made it resonate with the hum of energy within the existing barrier around the ruins. Like two waves of equal force meeting, the resonance had the effect of canceling out the two sheilds and allowing us the pass through. The ruins were much like the ones I had seen at Atlantis, only not as majestic. As we made our way through them to the main temple in the center of the city we were accosted by large amounts of plant-constructs. Allen and Folken were kept busy and I had used up most of the pesticides on my card despite my attempts to save them up for the fight ahead.

"There's just no end to them!" Allen grunted, finishing off another volley of plant-constructs.

"Best proceed with caution and not underestimate our enemy," Folken advised. "Allen, don't waste any more strength than you must. Keep in mind that these constructs are likely being sent to wear us down. We still have to kill the body of the Source Elemental before Hitomi can purify it."

"There's the temple," I said, pointing. It was built much the same as the one at the Holy Spring Ubdo, only without all of the water everywhere. Whatever it was that the Source Elemental coveted would probably be found in the main cathedral.

Folken took point and Allen watched my back, I made doubly sure to have my seals near to hand. This was it. I could sense the power of the source Elemental centrally located here.

The foyer was a crumbling ruin, overgrown with plants and now mostly open to the sky, but I'd bet that it had been pretty in its day. It was a pity it was such a ruin now. The central cathedral was also mostly open to the sky, what glass there had been was long gone and the pillars that had once held the ceiling were scatered into broken, crumbling segments, the ceiling itself was now sky except for in one corner that had managed to hold up against the elements.

In the center of the ruins waited our adversary.

"You gotta be kidding," I said, staring.

"It appears that Elementals are based upon their... utility, rather than their looks," Folken noted.

"A flower-demon?" Allen said incredulously. "I refuse. This is ridiculous. I can't believe we've been through all of this just to fight a walking bridal boquet!"

It was indeed, a variety of earth Elemental that's purpose was to correct decomposition of plant matter and pollen spreading. It was like a forest spirit, or it had been at one point. Now it looked like a ten-foot mossy version of swamp thing with those damned red-and-white flowers sticking out of it everywhere. I was honestly torn between laughter at the ridiculous thing we were to fight and terror that this thing was probably (ridiculous as it looked) quite, quite dangerous.

The moss-elemental made the first move. With a hissing, whoshing sound, it sprayed us all with a sleeping chemical that hit me like chloroform-gas. I was already dropping to my knees to slump unconscious when I managed to activate a Purify talisman with my last thought. I woke a moment later, all chemical sleep dissipated from me. The elemental tried again and I erected a barrier around the three of us so that the gas could not have it effect.

"Hitomi," Allen said. "Let me have one of those sleep nullifying talismans of yours. When I get close enough for it to use its sleep gas on me, activate it."

"Right," I said. After I gave Allen the card with the purifying pyrite stored within it he charged at the silly-looking but dangerous Elemental with his sword and promptly smote off it's head. Folken and I were about to cheer his victory when the enormous thing picked Allen up by the scruff off the neck like a doll and heaved him halfway across the temple.

"Now what?" I asked.

"Do you have any of those Plant-killing talismans left?" Folken asked.

"I have only one," I replied.

"Do you think it'll kill him?" Folken asked.

"Probably not," I said. "But we can try it."

Before I could do anything however Moss (as I had come to think of the Elemental) released his flying blossoms of death at us. The air was once again filled with stinging little flowers all swooping and diving at us raising stinging welts on my skin. Oh sure they were pretty enough, but a real nuisance.

"Wind!"

And they were all once again blown away by the breeze I summoned. Well, crap, I had one wind card left and Moss had already begun to sprout new flowers.

"Hitomi," Allen called hoarsely from where he had regained consciousness. "Where is the source Crystal?"

I looked with my othersight and found it in the center of the torso, glowing a malevolent red.

"In the torso," I called back. "His chest! I'll distract him while you strike... don't breathe in any of this mist!"

I sent a rolling blanket of choke mist in Moss' direction while Allen rushed through the cover to hack through its torso and extract the crystal. My attention was diverted from the fight however by the presence of another Source Energist. My brow furrowed in puzzlement. There were two of them? I turned to the doorway of the temple half-expecting to see another swamp-thing covered in flowers but was dismayed to see the snout of a dragon poking its way in. Great, this just got better and better.

Like must attract like in this case, I thought. Dragons were a sort of Elemental, they were living beasts that played much the same function as some Elementals did. They devoured the energist ore in the ground and purified it within thier bodies into crystalized energists. The dragon had surely sensed a nearby "food supply" and, hungry, had come to investigate.

The Source Crystal went flying through the air as Allen's sword dislodged it from the body of the Moss-thing. It tink-tinked a couple of times along the ground before spinning to a stop right before the dragon... who promptly swallowed it.

"Oh crap," I muttered, my heart sinking. I could see the malevolent power of the Source Energist begin to take hold of the dragon. With any luck...

I reached out to the meridians along the Drgaon's body and desperately tried to stop the spread of the Source energist's power, once it bonded with the energist in the dragon's chest there'd be no saving the dragon from being corrupted and we'd have a huge problem on our hands. I tried my hardest to stay one step ahead of the dark power racing like wildfire along the meridians in the dragons body but in the end, the dragon started changing.

"Folken! Allen's wounded, kill it first before it can change!" I yelled over to him.

It was already changing; its formerly tough hide grew plates of scaley armor and the Dragon grew from the size of a tool shed to the size of a small house. It's eyes went from their former rainbow-slits to golden glowing orbs the size of my head. Oh, great... it was huge.

I knew how Folken felt about killing dragons, and I knew that his quest to try to kill one had been what had caused him to loose his arm which acted as the catalyst for his joining the Zaibach empire. But I needed his sword right now, if we were to stop this beast before he hurt anyone we had to do it here.

Folken, however, froze up. I could sense the terror running off him in waves. The dragon snapped out its great new wings, an improvement on the mere flaps of skin it had once had for gliding, beat the air twice raising up and enormous cloud of dust, and took off, heading north.

"Hitomi, I-" Folken said, looking apologetic. I sighed tiredly.

"It's alright, I understand," I reassured him. "I couldn't beat the power of the source Elemental while it was still inside a physical host but I don't blame you for freezing up. Did you see the size of that thing? I'd have frozen up too!"

"But-" He said.

"Look, we all freeze up at one point or another," Allen said. "It's something you'll have to work through, but this isn't the end. We'll have to track it down."

"We're following it?!" I said, looking at him incredulously. He had to be kidding! Hadn't he seen how huge that thing had gotten?!

"We have to get that source crystal," Allen said logically. "Or _you _do anyway. We'll have to track it down in order to do so. But for now let's head back, the village is safe-"

"Until another Source Elemental becomes attracted to whatever is in here," I interrupted. "No before we head back I want to find whatever it was that the Draconian's sealed away in here that seems to be attracting Source Elementals and destroy it for good. Otherwise another Source Elemental is just going to sniff it out and start creating new troubles for the village of Adom."

Which reminded me, there was still the Elemental that had abandoned the Source Crystal here in the cathedral. In its natural state it was nothing more dangerous than a minor earth Elemental; it was ordinary green moss with tiny white shading to pink blossoms that spread its pollen (a moss that had pollen? weird). The plants were used as a local herb to induce sleep and relaxation.

In my Sight, the little earth Elemental looked at me with an aura of complete exhaustion; the sort of "food" it fed on was no-where to be found and the poor thing was being starved for lack of mystic energy.

"All right," I agreed, relenting to its silent plea for help.

I pulled on its seed sized foci and gathered it up to me in one of the blank talismans I had with me. It could live on the energy in the energist pyrite I had there for the time being until I could either locate and purify its home Source Crystal or lodge it in the crystal with Queenie back at the village.

"The danger of the Source Elemental has passed," said Folken. "It should be safe enough to split up and look around."

Folken took the side chapel to the right and Allen the one on the left. I went to get a closer look at that altar in this cathedral, my senses told me that whatever it was, was coming from there.

_It looks ordinary enough_, I thought. _I don't see anything truly unusual about it._

It was a square stone table raised on a circular dais with an octagon carved out of the surface of the table that had designs carved into it. My othersight showed a carved disk in the altar that glowed iridescently more brightly than the rest of it. For some reason, this spot had been touched more often than other places. Perhaps it was a secret button or something. I tried pushing on it, and nothing happened, then I tried pulling at it, still nothing. Shrugging I was about to walk away, when a vision teased at the edge of my senses. I saw one of the high preists that had once lived in this temple turn it a quater turn to the left, a half turn to the right, back three quarters to the left and then push on it. Oh, so that was how it worked then, each turn clicked one of the tumblers into place. Impulsively I turned back tot eh altar and copied the movements shown to me and watched as the lid slid sideways revealing that the large altar itself was hollow and opened up to show a black unfathomable hole. With a soft rumble a deep circular staircase made of long thick slabs of stone balanced atop each other a bit like a fan only going in two ends, winding down into the darkness underground.

I hadn't brought a flashlight with me, but my powers would provide I was sure. I summoned up a small globe of light fueled by my own powers and hopped over the side and into the first top step. There was no handrail so I had to be careful, I didn't know how far the darkness went. After the light from above me faded a bit when I proceeded deeper into the underground cavern the darkness seemed to stretch on forever. It was largely a matter of perception, there's just something about the darkness that made time seem to linger longer. When i checked my watch I noted that only a little actual time had passed.

When I reached the bottom, I wasn't much the wiser as to where I was... besides deep underground. I sent to globe to floating higher above me and to shine brighter so that I might see my surroundings. The cavern was roughly rectangular, and the stone floor had a strange intricate pattern worked into it like tile but obviously carved from the mother rock. Unlike many caves, there wasn't that musty smell that betrayed that it had been carved by water... so perhaps it had been carved by hand? Or maybe it had been Draconian magic.

Along the two longest walls were carvings, to be perfectly accurate, they were pictures, pictures exactly like the ones that I had seen in the cave beneath the sea where we'd found the Mirror of Truth in Freid; more carvings of the first days it appeared. I went over and brought my light for a closer look, bringing my camera out to fully document the carvings and paintings on the wall of the caves. I'd figure out what they meant later, I wasn't really interested in receiving any visions right then. Dragons were featured heavily in a number of the panels, but there were also ones featuring a woman in elaborate robes (or at least I assumed it was a woman due to the long hair) an intricate sword that looked like it was being bestowed upon someone in a ceremony, and a great tree behind them.

I looked at the blank space on the only wall in the room not occupied by pictures, half expecting to see an old oil lamp or something like that but instead was surprised to note that it was bare but for one thing; a great golden statue of a dragon. It rose up on its back haunches, three times the height of a man, even with its neck bowed down protectively over its mid-section. Its wings were mantled, like a mother bird protecting its young, and its fore-claws held… something. I couldn't quite make out what it was in the dark.

_Well, that explains what attracted the Source Elemental here in the first place,_ I thought. The thing reeked of Power, even without my Talents fully activated i would have been able to sense it. Just being in proximity to it made the hair on the back of my neck stand on end.

There was a heavy, impenetrable barrier around the statue which was likely why Moss hadn't been able to get at the object it had come here for. So the Source Elementals were looking for more power and would be attracted to Draconian artifacts that had it; that probably included dragon graveyards as well as possibly live dragons themselves. Anything with a ready source of that life-giving energy would be a target for attack by a Source Elemental. At least now I knew the likely places my prey would haunt; that was something I hadn't been certain of earlier this morning.

I walked closer to the statue to get a closer look at what the dragon was holding in its claws and felt the rousing of some great and ancient power in the back of my mind, like something was stirring in its sleep. With an invisible rush of a sourceless wind the room was suddenly filled with a Presence, like water filling an empty glass.

:**Who?**: asked a voice inside my head, the personality behind it felt like some great slumbering mountain. Before I could answer I was seized in the implacable grip of a greater mind, a power that was to mine as a pebble was to a mountain. It seemed to looked at me ponderingly, weighing me, measuring me. Just as abruptly as I was taken, it let me go.

:**Take** **This To The One Who Has Sworn Blood Pact To The Dragon. That One Will Bear Draco In Your Defense, Seer-Girl.**:

Then to my utter shock, the golden statue moved! One of the fore-claws reached down and handed me a long thin parcel wrapped in layers and layers of silk dressings, tied with cords of braided gold and silk. Even with its insulation of many layers of silk I could feel a nascent power throbbing from within it. I took the package in hands that were numb and after a blink that statue was back as if it had never moved and the presence I sensed was gone as though it had never been there.

I wondered for a moment if I hadn't imagined it all but then looked down at the package in my hands.

_Well, my weirdness meter just went through the roof,_ I thought a little ruefully. Things just kept getting weirder and weirder the longer I stayed here on Gaea.

"Hitomi?!" I heard someone calling frantically above me. Allen. Ooops, I'd forgotten to tell them where I was.

"Down here!" I called up. "Sorry, I got so caught up in my curiosity that I forgot to tell you guys where I was going."

"Are you alright?" Folken asked.

"I'm fine. I found something interesting though."

"You shouldn't wander off without telling someone where you are," Allen said, by the sound of things he was on his way down to upbraid me in person. "What if something had happened to you and neither of us knew where you were?"

"I would send an Elemental to lead you to me," I replied. "I've enough power to grant a body to a small one so that you can see it."

"And what if you'd encountered another Source Elemental and neither of us had been here to help?"

"I'm hardly helpless myself guys," I said, nettled a little. "But you are right and I should have thought to tell you. I'll be more careful, I promise. Now take a look at this."

Folken had come alongside Allen down the twisting spiral staircase and as soon as he saw the carvings on the wall was immediately immersed. He always had seemed more like the studied intellectual of the two brothers... granted, Van wasn't all brawn and no brains either but he didn't seem as enthused about being surrounded by history. He was the more pragmatic of the brothers, he liked something that he could grasp and use in the present.

While we explored the underground room more fully I told Folken and Allen of my conclusions about the Source Elementals definately being attracted to energists and other ready supplies of the same life-energy that had once flowed along the meridians of this world. The bit about the statue I kept to myself, they'd believe me about most things but a moving, talking dragon statue was stretching the bounds of credulity a bit.

That's odd, I noted with puzzlement. I was holding the mysterious package before me in my arms and neither Allen nor Folken had asked about it. It seemed like they didn't even notice it! Was it protecting itself perhaps? Given the strange things that had just passed I couldn't dismiss the idea out of hand in all honesty.

Folken, who was studying the pictures on the wall, turned to me and said

"Hitomi, I note that you do not wear your own pendant any longer. Have you perhaps given it to my brother as a keep-sake then?"

"Oh bugger," I muttered, slapping my forehead and mentally calling myself four kinds of an idiot. With that draconian pendant hanging about his neck for all and sundry to grab at and use it was like putting up a big neon sign that said 'blue plate special on Fanelian kings... get 'em while they're hot!' If he hadn't been ambushed by Source Elementals by now, he soon would be!

"Van!" I exclaimed, worried already. "We have to go, now! He's surely in danger."

"Slow down," Allen said. "Don't go rushing off half-cocked into territory that still has its share of dangers. Van has been fine up until now and that isn't likely to change any time in the immediate future. For now, let's head back to the village and give a full report to the Elders. They should know at least that there is something likely to attract more Source Elementals nearby and to be on the lookout for them."

I wonder if this thing I'm holding in my hands that no one else but me seems to see is the very thing that's attracting those Elementals I thought to myself.

We arrived back at the village in an hour or so to be greeted by the entire village keeping an anxious lookout. I was startled and a little gratified to hear the cheer that went up when we were spotted.

"How went the hunt?" I was asked by a hopeful Nukushi.

"The Source Elemental was destroyed," I said. "However there is a danger that the ruins will attract more of them at some point in the future. I've done what I could to boost the shielding, but there's still the chance that a Source Elemental will sniff it out despite my attempts to guard it."

"The fact that we are rid of the beast is still cause for celebration," Nukushi's wife, the Head Lady Hakara said. The villagers split down the middle to reveal a collection of tables set out around a central bonfire laden with all kinds of different dishes. They'd prepared a potluck for us! How thoughtful!

"Your friends told us that the use of your Gifts make you exceedingly hungry so we took the liberty of preparing a feast in your honor," Nukushi said, bowing and showing me to what was obviously the place of honor, right in front of the bonfire.

"Thank-you very much!" I said bowing low in embarrassment at all of the attention. "I'm very honored by the thoughtfulness and hospitality you all have shown me."

Yukari and Amano were already sitting down waiting for me and Celena had tied Dilandau up to a nearby post so that they could all keep an eye on him. I plopped tiredly down in the place Nukushi had shown me to followed by Folken and Allen on my other side and the feast commenced.

I got my first real taste of Fanelian cooking (we'd been eating from our own supplies up until that point so as not to place too great a burden on our hosts) and found it very much to my taste. It wasn't overly spiced but rather good, hearty, stuff that really filled the desire to eat good cooking. The meat wasn't tough despite having been roasted over a fire, and the herbs they did use to spice them had a very wild, fresh taste to them. They had dishes of thier local equivalent of moose or caribou, and they had a lot of dishes with fish from the river, they seemed to prefer stuffing it with wild onions and sage (it tasted like sage anyways) and baking it in clay over coals. They actually had an entire roast calf on a spit over the bonfire!

And let me mention possibly the best thing they had at that feast... thier ale and whiskey was the best I'd ever tasted before. Apparently, they were like irish folk when it came to thier beverages, they liked a good well brewed lager and a fine aged whiskey. They liked thier beer like they liked thier food, hearty and flavorful. Me Yukari and Amano gave them full props in our books for having the best beverages made of hops anywhere we'd visited on Gaea. The local brewer was pleased with the compliments and happy to discuss the brewing proceedure with Amano who was an avid listener of such things.

I was asked to tell everyone about the battle against the Source Elemental but was a little embarrased to sing my own praises. I appealed to Allen to be the story teller since I was busy stuffing my face, and he did so good naturedly.

Later, after most of the people there had eaten thier fill, people hauled out thier instruments, assorted drums, systrums, pipes, guitars (or local equivalent) and I was surprised to note they had something close to a fiddle and they began to play. Their music was much likethier food and drink, as good and filling for the soul as it was for the body. The rythm was infectious, it wasn't long before Amano and Yukari (the outgoing pair) had gotten up and started dancing. I was still busy making an unabashed glutton of myself so I simply clapped along when my hands were free.

The party raged late into the night and I'd had more than a few before I called it quits and stumbled off to my futon. I didn't know whether it continued for very long without the guest of honor (probably) for I was asleep as soon as my head touched the pillow.

The next morning I had a bit of a headache from my earlier overindulgence in that fine Fanelian ale they had here but someone had thoughtfully left a steaming cup of tea nearby on a breakfast tray to help me out. It was probably some local headache cure. I sent a wave of purging energies along my meridians as soon as I was aware enough to do to to take care of the rest of my hangover. There were distinct advantages to having these odd abilities of mine! Once the last of my headache faded I remembered what I had forgotten the night before in all of the fun and festivities.

I have to warn Van! followed by I still have to find that Dragon!

I unsucessfuly tried to rouse Yukari and Amano (who'd had way more to drink last night that I had) but gave it up for a lost cause after a few minutes. I'd let them sleep it off, I could just go ahead and pack up to depart. Head Lady Kakara had generously made sure that my laundry was done which reminded me that I could rather do with a bath. The village did have a bathhouse and I joined the other women in cleaning off and a little village gossip.

It was halfway to noon when my companions finally roused and we could start to pack up in earnest. When The SUV was all loaded up I made my goodbyes to the grateful Villagers and thanked thier elders again for their hospitality. I had left a way to reach me in case another Source Elemental should move into the area.

I left my purified peice of Source energist in Adom with its resident air elemental. Air elementals were the best at relaying messages for they could travel as fast as the wind. I gave Queenie standing orders that if Nukushi asked her to send word to me about a new threat she was to relay that to me at once.

We drove off, heading north toward Fanelia City for two reasons, one was that I still had to warn Van about the danger he was in if he didn't know already and the other was that I had sensed my new Source Dragon headed in that direction as well. With any luck it's lair would be close by. Even if the Dragon had a lair in another place I could still sense the vague warping feel of the negative energy given off by a Source Elemental in that direction; there were more of them to the north I wasn't sure how far north or how big they were, but they were there alright.

Amano was going top-speed and the scenery was whizzing past, but with the Fanelian roas system the way it was riding in the SUV was a lot like riding a roller coaster, if the seat belt hadn't been restraining me I'd have been out of my seat. Folken said that under most conventional meathods of travel ie yak-beast wagons or horseback the trip from Adom to Fanelia city usually took about a day and a half. Yay for earther-style travel I say.

On the road again...

A.N. Well, there she is, and what a doozy! I don't remember off hand how long this chapter was, but it's probably one of the longer ones in this thing. Still, I wanted it get it all over with in one shot because the next chapter is the part you've all been waiting for... (finally) the triumphant emergence of Van! Look forward to it please! And reveiw.


End file.
